


Kisses from Inferno

by CosmicRooibos (MurasakiDoku)



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Anal Sex, Blowjobs, Christmas, Deepthroat, Demon AU, Discussions of mental illness, Happy Sex, Multi, Polyamory, Queening, Rimjobs, Sex Clubs, Slut Shaming, Suicide (minor character), Transgender Topics, Witch AU, Witchcraft, age difference (but not what you're used to expecting), aka in which junkrat is literally the canon bicycle, bisexual roadhog, consent is important, excessive displays of vanity, excessive early relationship fluff, excessive slice of life, eye gore, handjobs, incubus themes, invasion of digital pivacy, moping, more tags forthcoming, safe sex, there are multiple ships tagged but this is primarily roadrat, worldbuilding mildly inspired by bayonetta
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2018-10-07
Packaged: 2019-02-25 21:07:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 17
Words: 93,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13221267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MurasakiDoku/pseuds/CosmicRooibos
Summary: A fledgeling witch meets a wayward demon.





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [Silly](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Scrunchles/pseuds/Scrunchles) for editing/beta!

Jamison Fawkes wakes up tangled in two other bodies.

It’s a cold autumn day in Melbourne; he wants to stay curled up, absorbing the warmth of his bedmates and chasing tidbits of dreams from the night before. However, none of them can afford that kind of time on this particular morning. The sun peeking through the bedroom’s window merits just as much cursing as thanks. Careful to avoid waking either of them, Jamie slowly wrenches his limbs free to wander to the kitchen in all his nude glory.

The process of making a hangover-warding breakfast is just enough activity, even when he tries to be as quiet as possible, to stir the bedroom. The first to step out into the kitchen is Hana, whose normally smooth and silky hair is a post-coitus knotted nightmare — but from her slouched posture and cranky scowl as she takes a seat at the kitchen table, it’s going to be some time before she cares about it. Jamie doesn’t care either way — after all, he’s the reason it looks like that. There’s a fine art to hair pulling, and he was more than happy to teach Lúcio how to maximise impact while minimising risk of injury.

“G’morning,” he says with a cheerfulness that rivals the morning sun. The response is a grumble as she takes a seat at the kitchen table, staring vacantly into the oak grain. Several minutes pass before her staring is blocked by a plate full of colour: bright green fresh avocado, chopped hard boiled eggs, and two slices of whole wheat toast, served with a glass of coconut water. Hana murmurs some kind of thanks as she initiates auto-pilot to fork pieces of food into her mouth.

Lúcio enters next, just as groggy but looking in better spirits — especially when he sees the food that awaits him on the table. “Aw, yeah,” he murmurs gleefully, hopping into a chair. “Thanks man!”

“No worries,” Jamie returns, equally cheerful as he fills the last remaining seat. The three of them eat in relative silence, only the occasional clattering of utensils against porcelain ringing through the kitchen. Being the most awake of the three of them, Jamie finishes his food first.  He rinses the kitchenware before throwing it in the washer, and then runs off to the bathroom. Neither of his companions could beat him if they tried.

When he gets back with a towel tied around his waist and his shock-blonde hair weighed down and slicked back, he finds Lúcio at the kitchen counter taking care of the remaining dishes  while Hana goes through her phone. Jamie is the most dressed of the lot with his meagre towel.

“I don’t know how you do it,” Lúcio comments. “Getting two celebrities’ schedules to line up like this? Ever considered becoming someone’s agent?”

“Only if I can put ya down fer references.” Jamie approaches from behind, towering over the musician with his reedy body. He puts a hand on the outside of Lucio’s hip, and dark skin pimples under the cold touch of his prosthetic hand.

“Yeah? And what work would I say you did for me?”

 “Consultation,” he says easily. A beat, and then he shifts to grab a handful of ass, eliciting a yelp. “Sex consultation.”

“Stop—stop!” Lúcio barks out with a laugh. “I’m gonna have to start my day with a cold shower thanks to you.”

 “Have at it then,” Jamie says with a smirk, taking a half-step back and swatting his ass to get him moving again. “I took up all the hot water anyway.”

 “All right, all right, I’m goin’ I’m goin’!”

 Jamie watches him walk away with a self-satisfied grin on his face.

 “He’s right, you know,” comes a voice from behind him. Hana still has her nose buried in her phone, but her eyes flick up from her phone to look at him when he turns to her. “The first time could have been a coincidence. Second time, luck. But a third? That’s some kind of skill outside of just networking.”

 Jamie simply shrugs. He turns to leave and Hana returns to her game, but he returns soon after with a hairbrush and stands behind Hana, starting to ease those tangles out. “I get that a lot from people who _aren’t_ household names and I always tell’m the same thing I’ve told you guys. It’s all situational awareness and the courage to throw a line to see if someone will bite. And you two always do, so I can’t take _all_ the credit.”

 “I can’t think of a reason why someone would decline an offer like yours. You have…” She turns her head to the side to get a peek at him, a body without a drop of fat and an abdomen designed for washing clothes. “Universal appeal.”

 “Aw, cheers—“

 “And the skills to match.”

 “Now yer just tryin’ ta make me blush.”

 Hana shrugs, returning her attention to her phone. “Humble, too,” she says.

 ———————————————

 It’s the same morning he’s had for the last fifteen years. Mako Rutledge wakes up to his lonely presence in his studio apartment, surrounded by stuffed animals and mascots. For the longest time, they were all the company he needed when he went home to recharge his exhaustion from social obligations. A few years ago he started getting this growing feeling that he’d enjoy it a lot more if he could find someone to enjoy it with, leaving him in an awkward limbo of wanting to keep to himself and wanting to share a very sacred part of his private life with someone. 

More frustrating than the conflict of two opposite urges pulling at each other was when he tried to indulge the former. He’d waited much too long, and those few and far between who were (a) in his age range, and (b) still single, all inevitably have a variant of the same question:

“Oh,” they say delightedly, “do you have a daughter?”

The answer is no. And it usually follows with more probing questions as to why a middle-aged man collects cute things… or a pregnant, judging silence.

He offers them the opportunity to leave if they want. Some of them actually take it and he barely hears from them again. He knows it doesn’t bother him as much as it probably should… at least, not enough to change his ways. After all, the world is full of too much darkness and evil to throw away the things that make him feel happy, safe, and warded.

These are the thoughts swirling in his head as he prepares a hot cup of black tea and breakfast. He can’t get to work soon enough.  These uncomfortable, irreconcilable feelings only bubble up when he’s surrounded by the lonely silence of his apartment. At least the background noise of nature documentaries or cartoons gives him some sense of company. While his wards and stuffed guardians keep away the literal demons, the sound of the world outside keeps the mental ones in check.. Most of the time.

He packs a big lunch for himself, gets dressed, and then hops on his bike to get to work. The streets of Melbourne provide a refreshing, crisp April morning for his commute. Pedestrians wear light jackets and lightly pepper the sidewalks, and at red lights he allows himself a moment to look around to remind himself why a man who prefers to keep to himself would move into the heart of one of Australia’s biggest cities.  Contrary to popular opinion back home, he actually _does_ like people… he just has a unique way of showing it.

At one intersection, he spots a stray cat, sitting on a garbage can. At least, that’s what everyone else sees. In his eyes, he witnesses the presence of a being excised from nightmares and born into the real world—an appearance that would make weaker-willed people vacate their stomach contents in fear. He could only describe it as some kind of combination of hawk and tiger, but its flesh pulled away to reveal bloody muscle and sinew, full of acid-dripping fangs and decorated with only a sparing selection of feathers on the ends of its diseased wings, tail a length of exaggerated vertebrae and abdomen carved out to expose organs and rib cage. Mako knows its kind by the name _Ire._

Despite the churn in his stomach, Mako turns away casually to look back up at the traffic light. He has seen many _Ire_ throughout his life, as well as a plethora of other demonic beings—and he knows that the best way to catch their attention, other than to be a gullible fool, is to make them realise you can see them for what they truly are. Nothing is more of a threat to their well-being than someone who can see them except for someone who can perform exorcisms. Unfortunately, Mako only holds one of those two talents, leaving him exposed.

He lets out an uneasy breath, letting the vibrations of his chopper ease into his flesh and soothe him as the light turns green.

———————————————

It’s a rather uneventful day in the library, which isn’t actually something Mako gets to say very often. As a place that is open to anyone, free of charge, with access to technology that the less privileged wouldn’t otherwise have, it occasionally attracts those seeking to abuse that generosity. 

That doesn’t mean it’s any less busy. He’s the only one at the front desk for the time being, helping a short queue of people check out their books and media. Like him, many patrons are quiet, shy individuals, perfectly content with his method of using as few words as possible for the process. Frankly, it’s his comfort zone. It’s enough not to notice an unfamiliar face come in through the front door until he’s standing in front of the directory.

Mako jolts, lets out a short gasp, and then turns around to look out the window to the doorframe for the front door. The dark wood frame is hand-carved with designs that might look simply ornate, but they’re actually sigils — wards against ill intents and demons, enchantments to help patrons with their studies, to grant peaceful thoughts and bolster creativity. All of them are still intact, and yet…

He turns back toward the newest patron. His disguise is that of an unusually tall, towheaded college student with pale skin and amber eyes — but his actual appearance…well, it’s the same physique and stature, but with red skin and dark ashy hair, yellow eyes from iris to cornea, and black, ram-like horns. Mako can’t tell what family he belongs to, since there’s countless demons that appear humanoid… but if he can walk past sigils without so much as a flinch, he must belong to a powerful one. More curious than that, though…

Why is a demon in a library? Is he _that_ committed to his deceptive bit?

“Mate?” the young woman on the other side of the desk asks timidly. “You all right?”

“Ah, yes.” He gives her the best smile he can, even though his eyes are obscured by dark lenses. “Just remembered something.”

He stamps her book and places it on the other side of the scanner. She thanks him and heads out on her way, leaving four people behind in her wake. He can’t abandon this line to investigate this demon (and try to get it out of his library), so he’ll just have to deal with it first.

The demon seems preoccupied with trying to parse out the Dewey decimal system, rather than looking for victims, for the time being. It seems like he can afford the delay, and when he finally gets through the line (and calls up an aide to replace his position) he starts a hunt through the stacks to find his unwanted visitor.

“Seven…seven-six, seven-six, seven-seven, seven-seven-five…three…aaaaand…four! Here we go.” Jamie plucks a well-worn book nestled between equally worn books. It has long lost its sleeve, the embossed title and author just barely holding onto its colour. Even though it’s old, it doesn’t mean that it has what he’s looking for — so he takes a seat on the round half-step meant for reaching the taller shelves, drops his messenger bag on the floor, and leafs through it. He means only to get an idea of whether or not it’s worth checking out, but his fascination ends up getting the best of him and he is immersed in a paragraph that spends more time talking about the cultural impact of Roman architecture than the actual math behind it.

Mako doesn’t know what section he was expecting to find the demon hiding, but engineering science wouldn’t have scored very high. He turns the corner to find the cheeky “twenty-something” perched on a stool, totally engrossed.

Engrossed enough not to notice that he’s being stared at. Mako clears his throat and places his hands on his hips, taking up the entire width of the aisle and leaving only one route for escape… except the same goes for him, too. Even though he puts on a tough façade, there’s a storm of anxiety in his gut as there always is when he’s faced with an infernal denizen — but he learned a long time ago that the best way to deal with demons is to treat them as what they choose to appear as. Since this one chooses the appearance of a punky college student…

Jamie squawks and jolts, the book falling from his grip and clattering to the ground. Only now does Mako notice that both his disguise and his actual appearance is missing both a right arm and leg, replaced with prosthetic limbs that would look more at home in an automotive shop because they certainly aren’t trying to hide what they are. His shirt has some kind of graphic on it that Mako can’t see from this vantage point, under a beaten-up hoodie with the sleeves pulled up to his elbows to make clearance for his prosthetic forearm. He’s got cargo pants that cut off at the knees, providing the same favour for his prosthetic knee, and the messenger bag at his side is pock-marked with pins and patches. Over his single, well-worn orthopaedic runner is a rather ornate, heavily stated bracelet that Mako recognises as balancing _Manipura._

The demon’s surprise is no act, because his real face and his disguise are perfectly synchronised. It’s not unwarranted. Mako is tall enough to reach the top shelf of these stacks even without so much as a stretch, dressed in black slacks and a double-breasted waistcoat over a white button-up, sleeves similarly pulled up over his elbows to reveal an excess of years-old ink that starts from his first knuckles and leaving very little tan skin unmarked. His fingers are decorated with a variety of different silver pieces, and the combination of his jewellery and black clothing matches the pitch-black, circular sunglasses that completely obscure his eyes from the front and hide the sides with silver temple shields. His age-whitened hair is long, but it’s true length is obscured with the large, loose bun it’s been tied up in. His style is undeniably goth, but understated enough to still be professional and classy, and his presence is — as always — intimidating as he wants it to be.

“Sorry, sorry,” Jamie spits out before Mako can even say anything, scrambling to pick himself and his things up. “I should’ve—picked out a table—instead of…” He trails off and starts limping in the opposite direction, book tucked under his arm.

It’s the strangest thing, Mako thinks. A supposedly powerful demon like him could easily get uppity to try to tempt Mako into acting brashly, try to generate fear or anger just for kicks, but instead he’s scampering off like a kid scared of getting scolded. Still not an act; his knife-spaded tail, invisible to any normal human, curls in on itself as if he were showing submission to a greater power.

As confusing as this demon is, he’s still a _demon_ , and the last thing Mako wants him to feel is welcome in his library, even to a table to read at.

“Did you find everything you were looking for?” he asks, just enough presumptive urgency in his voice to imply he should move on. Jamie stops in his tracks, and there’s a pregnant pause as he weighs his options. The answer is no, he didn’t find everything, but does he really want help from someone whose aura feels like he’d turn a book-filled shelf on top of him just for talking too loud? 

School takes priority, he decides, and this is the only library that said it had the books he was looking for. He’s dealt with worse than blokes with unfriendly attitudes. Jamie stands up to his full height and turns around.

“Actually…no, there’s one I haven’t found,” he informs, then digs around in his hoodie pocket for a crumpled piece of paper and hands it over. Mako drops his arms to take it from him, reading the titles and their assignments and immediately knows what he hasn’t been able to find. Mako internally groans in frustration, but keeps a stone-cold face.

“Anything that ends with a letter is in the vault. You can read them, but you can’t check them out.” Which means that, whatever he’s looking for, he won’t be leaving any time soon. 

“So you do have it?” Jamie asks excitedly, his expression brightening and his tail swishing behind him gleefully. Frankly, the authenticity is starting to be more unsettling than the fact he’s gotten in here in the first place.

“We’re about to find out,” he says, folding the paper in half and sticking it in his breast pocket. “Come with me.”

He leads the other to a nondescript door tucked away in a part of the library that doesn’t stand out on its own, marked with an AUTHORISED PERSONNEL ONLY sign. Mako simply unlocks the door and opens it to allow Jamie to pass before following him up and closing the door behind him.

The air is quite different from the rest of the library — adjusted to preserve books for as long as possible rather than making it comfortable for people.  It’s dry and cool, and it _smells_ of old books.

“Have a seat,” Mako commands, gesturing to a table in the centre before disappearing among the shelves, leaving Jamie on his lonesome with a bare wood table and matching chair. Since he’s not sure how long mister goth-librarian is going to take, he pulls out the book from earlier and continues to read it.

As Mako gingerly pulls two decrepit books from their places, he realises that he _could_ have just said outright that they didn’t have these books, and that probably would have gotten rid of him. It’s not too late to try to pull that stunt, but… it seems like his pride in his work is getting in his way.

“Turns out we have them,” he declares, as he places them on the table beside the demon-turned-college student. Jamie looks over at them and winces. _Well-loved_ would be an awfully optimistic way of describing them.

“Due to their rarity and state, you’ll have to be monitored while you use them,” Mako half-lies. He doesn’t need to be monitored, really, just expected to stay in here — but Mako wants the excuse to keep an eye on him.

“The things I do for primary literature…” Jamie murmurs under his breath, clearly audible in the silence of the vault.

Mako scoffs, a corner of his mouth turning upward, because he can honestly relate to the sentiment… but he awaits the inevitable request that anyone interested in the vault books has.

Jamie handles them like they’ll fall apart, even going so far as to avoid using his prosthetic fingers. The old glue of the binding of the first book snaps and creaks as it’s opened, and Jamie cringes. These books should have been restored decades ago, but Jamie is probably the first one to open it in at least twenty years.

“No way these will stand up to a photocopier. Feels like the wrong breeze would take five pages with it!” Jamie giggles lightly, then reaches down into his messenger bag and pulls out his tablet. “Time for some old-school note taking.”

Huh. Maybe the request wasn’t so inevitable after all. Mako resists the habitual urge to say _take your time_ before heading towards an older computer setup in the back corner, still in view of the table. For what it’s worth, he’ll have plenty to work on while playing chaperone. He knows for a fact that it hasn’t been upgraded to the new library directory software that the rest of the computers have.

The first half-hour passes without much event. Since there are no windows in the vault, it doesn’t feel like any time has gone by. The soft tapping of Jamie’s stylus against his tablet accompanies the clicking of the older computer’s keyboard, creating a mild-mannered sonnet of productivity. There’s a slow lull, and Jamie sits back in his chair, causing the cheap wood to creak. He throws his arm over the back of it.

“So…”

Mako looks up from the monitor. Eye contact is made — as best as it can.

“How do you do it?”

Mako’s eyebrow arches. “Do what?”

“Well, I’m the last person that would think that a blind person can’t work at a library. But I haven’t seen a single set of Braille and it doesn’t look like you’re using audio assistance…”

The misunderstanding is pretty common, and Mako doesn’t necessarily mind, especially when approached so bluntly. It’s easy to correct people when they do that, instead of silently making the assumption without actually confirming it, then acting upon those assumptions. 

“I’m not blind.”

“Visually impaired, then.”

“Nope.”

“Fucked up eyes?”

Mako nearly snorts. This is getting awfully needling, especially for a stranger — and even more so for a demon. “No. Tell me what happened to your right side, and I’ll tell you.” A demon can never turn down a deal and, frankly, he sees no problem with letting his curiosity get the better of him as well.

“Oh.” For the first time, the disguise and his actual body suddenly break synchronicity, and only in the most subtle way: he breaks eye contact, and the disguise looks off to the right, while his real body looks to the lower left. Mako can tell he’s lying even before the words come out of his mouth: “Got hit by a car when I was thirteen. Used to walk and bike damn near everywhere back then… even in the worst weather conditions. Got pancaked between a hydroplaning car and a road barrier.”

Since the demon doesn’t hold up his end of the bargain, Mako doesn’t have to either. He lets out a hum of consolation out of obligation before offering his own story, nodding his head towards the ceiling light hanging above Jamie’s table:

“Light sensitivity.”

The demon boggles at him, his appearances once again synchronizing. There’s a long silence before he speaks up again.

“That’s not very dramatic…”

Mako shrugs. “Not every personal trial is novel-worthy.”

Jamie snorts out a laugh. “Yeah, alright. Fair enough.”

The two fall into a comfortable silence after that, even for Mako. Sure, he may still be sharing a space that should be sanctuary with a demon, but enough time has passed to convince him that the demon isn’t a threat. He supposes that it’s only natural that a demon with at least human-level intelligence would need hobbies just like anyone else.

Another hour passes. Mako finds his mind wandering while he waits for a progress bar on the computer to fill, and the damn thing’s demanded priority so he can’t do anything else. He’s distracted by his thoughts when he hears wood creak—Jamie leans back in the chair again, exhausted by his intense note-taking; he closes his eyes and rubs them with his real fingers. He’s not been here for long, but it betrays the fact that he’s actually been _working_ on this all day, and only now does Mako get some idea of this. Again, his curiosity gets the better of him.

“What are they having you work on?”

“Ah, it’s a research and development project. The idea is that we compare and contrast modern and ancient technology, then combine the concepts into a design of our own.”

Mako idly muses that a demon probably has a hard time discerning what’s considered ancient and modern.

“Pretty sure everyone’s going to go with some boring Roman or Greek project,” he continues, stretching his arm out and pushing the book he was reading in the library proper away from himself with his stylus, as if suddenly finding it distasteful despite being totally into it a while ago. “Whole English-speaking world’s got their panties all wet over the ancient Mediterranean civilisations—“

His speech gets more feverish. Mako’s eyebrows raise. 

“—always talkin’ about this Mesopotamia-Gilgamesh epic-River basin same-shit, same-shit, all’s we ever care to talk about this Abraham bloke and the books that came after, bunch’a old men sitting around in togas makin’ half-baked governments that lead to other half-baked governments, ignore what makes them great and tailor it to some backwards agenda and the Queen thinks she’s hot shit and takes things that ain’t hers and tells ‘em to do the same boring bullshit over and over again…”

And it all comes out in one breath. Mako’s glasses nearly fall off his face. It’s been a long time since he’s heard anyone go an unwarranted angry rant about history. One look at Mako and Jamie claps his hands over his mouth, because he really didn’t mean to go on a foul-mouthed rant with a complete stranger.

“And you’re… _not_ a history major?”

Jamie drops his hands. “No. Dual major in mechanical and chemical engineering.”

“Think you might’ve missed your calling.”

Jamie sighs and shrugs. “Look, mate, I just don’t like being bored. Spent history class in high school talkin’ about all this stuff, and then when I started uni we just went over the same exact shit as if they expected us ta forget about it all since graduating. Schoolies wasn’t _that_ much of a rager.”

Mako pushes his glasses back up the bridge of his nose. Jamie holds up his tablet for the other to see.

“We live on a _whole planet_ and scholars only want to talk about the parts of it that get their cocks wet, livin’ out their power fantasies and thinkin’ only their kind are the only ones capable of comin’ up with somethin’ fekkin’ pearlah.”

Mako can’t help but chuckle as he watches this demon-come-human slowly morphs from speaking like a well-educated young man to a larrikin with the thickest Strayan he’d heard since moving in from the country. He has one arm crossed over his chest, the other using it as a prop to hold up his chin as he gives Jamie an amused grin. There’s such disarming honesty in his angry ranting.

“And that’s why you wanted books on ancient Asian scientific history,” Mako offers.

Jamie nods. “From back when people used to include pictures of where they got their info. This one’s aces, actually — nothing but pictures and translations here, no fluff, no conjecture.”

“But you haven’t been relying on the translations.”

Jamie pauses. What an odd, random thing to throw out there. “What makes you say that?”

Mako lets go of his chin and points at the tablet Jamie’s still holding up.

“Your notes are in Chinese.”

Jamie brings back down the tablet with a look of disbelief, then squawks in surprise and covers it with his hand, as if it were meant to be some big secret. Mako chuckles, and Jamie chews on his plastic stylus, trying to decide if he should try to retranslate it or keep it as-is. All the demons Mako’s ever seen were always cunning, manipulative, clearly maleficent, every word and action a carefully constructed piece of a puzzle to get what they want…but this one? Besides his lie to obscure the real reason why he lost his limbs — a fairly reasonable thing for anyone to lie about — there’s not been a single second that wasn’t completely honest and real, even when he could’ve put just a little bit of effort in to save face.

And that’s when Mako realises he’s lost focus and hasn’t been able to see the disguise in a while. He blinks his eyes and tries to refocus them, and a faint ghost image of the reedy punk comes back.

“We’re closing in about half an hour,” he offers, as if that will help Jamie decide if he needs to translate his own notes or not.

“Ah, okay. In that case…” He closes the book gingerly, then pulls out his phone. “I’ve gotta get a ride.”

Mako’s stomach hits the floor. One glance at the other’s phone, and he can practically watch whatever fortitude he had crumple into pieces. He really shouldn’t say anything, but once again, his damn curiosity gets the best of him.

“You…” 

Jamie looks up.

“You’re into Pachimari?”

“Oh yeah!” he says cheerfully. He reaches around with his prosthetic hand and balances the little mascot phone charm on his index finger. She’s got a pair of big star-shaped sunglasses on and a tentacle wrapped around a bubblegum pink electric guitar; from the second set in the blind box series _Kyaria no Pachimari._ “I love Pachimari, mate! My friend Hana got me into it a few years ago.”

Unbelievable. A demon managed to get into his library to check out books instead of causing trouble, has the gall to have hobbies outside of tricking humans to give into their desires, and one of them is _cute things._ This has to be a dream or the beginnings of a nightmare where the other shoe hasn’t dropped yet, so Mako decides to tempt fate:

“Aren’t you a little old to like Pachimari?”

Jamie’s expression suddenly goes sour. Mako can see the hellfire behind the horrid, angry glare that sends a cold, fearful spike down his spine.

“Yeah, right.” he says, venom in his voice. “What would an old, sad edgelord like you understand about Pachimari?”

And willing to go at bat for said _cute things,_ too. Mako wasn’t expecting to find a kindred soul in the damned. Despite his fear, he grins and goes into his breast pocket to pull out his own phone adorned with similar charms: one Pachimari with a black tophat, a monocle, and a tiny little teacup, and another one with no props but has a bright pink body from the _Niji Pachimari_ series. To boot, his lock screen lights up to show the time, and the background is a promotional poster for the latest animated special.

“Plenty.”

Jamie cows, having been shown up tenfold even faster than he can bite back.

“You—you got your hands on Tycoon Pachimari,” he stutters, awed. “How many boxes did you have to go through to find it?”

Mako holds up his hands. “You shouldn’t ask such personal questions, young man.”

Jamie laughs; a hearty laugh that boils out from the bottom of his gut. It’s infectious, and Mako finds himself chuckling along.

“You’re alright, mate.” Jamie hands him the books, carefully piled on top of each other. “Thanks for the help today.”

“Anytime,” Mako returns, collecting the pile in his own hand. “Do you want to check out the other ones today?”

“Yeah, nah…I found what I needed in the old ones. I’ll be back to work on them more tomorrow.”

“In that case, have a good night, mister…”

“Fawkes. Jamison Fawkes—you can call me Jamie though.” He offers his hand, and since Mako can hold the collection of books easily in one hand, he transfers them over to one to free up the other for a handshake.

“Mako Rutledge. I own this place, so ask for me by name if you need anything.”

“Own it?! Well, that certainly explains a lot!” Jamie stands up, hoisting his bag strap over his head to rest across his body. “See ya tomorrow!”

He leaves the vault room, closing the door behind him.

Mako sighs, letting out the tension in his shoulders as he stands in the vault by himself. So much for being an uneventful day.


	2. II

_Pleiades_ is a rather cheerful tongue-in-cheek club in the heart of Melbourne, not particularly wide but high enough to have several floors, the highest of which grant a breathtaking view over the Yarra River. The first floor is a warm, welcoming bar that attracts a significant number of tourists thanks to being sandwiched between hotels and attractions. The “VIP section” that leads upstairs is more than what it says on the label, where membership is only available by invitation. If you have to ask what the VIP section has to offer, you don’t belong there in the first place.

It’s not just another bar on the second floor. It also acts as a sound buffer between the much more active first floor and the quiet, warmly lit lounge of the third. The decor is darkly coloured, and the walls are black with tiny fairy lights that give the impression of the starry night sky of the club’s namesake. The dress code is a scale from formal to nude, given some exceptions for themed nights, and tonight just happens to be one of them: corsets and fishnets.

Jamie has found himself a quiet spot on an otherwise empty balcony, taking in the view of Melbourne’s late night skyline. It’s still early enough for lights to shine out of the windows of towering buildings, providing artificial stars in an otherwise starless sky. The city is mirrored on the river, subtly rippled by the waves of a recent boat passing. He wears a dark, double-breasted coat that he has to admit is somewhat inspired, crisp angles both emphasising and flattering his long, angular physique, wide shoulders and hips to match. In one hand, he holds a lowball glass of ginger beer and spiced rum, and in the other, an electronic cigarette.

He inhales benign vapour, lighting up the back of his hand with a sunny yellow glow, and exhales with a sigh. His presence here is purely necessity; his mind keeps wandering and it makes it difficult to focus. He doesn’t even notice the sound of the tinted glass window behind him open and then slide closed; he gets blindsided--quite literally--when a pair of hands comes up behind him and covers his eyes.

“Guess who ♪~”

Jamie instantly recognises the voice, and it brings a grin to his face.

“I’m thinkin’... Sangria on Cancún.”

His field of vision returns to him in a flash of purple manicure, and he turns his head to the side to see her enter his peripheral vision with a mild flourish.

“ _¡Ta-rán!_ ”

“ _¡Buenas tardes!_ I didn’t know ya were in town, Sombra.”

“You know how work is,” she says with a dismissive shrug. Actually, he has  _no_ idea how her work is, and he learned long ago that drilling her for information just ends with him in a conversational hall of mirrors. As she leans against the railing, Jamie’s eyes scan down her body. She’s come prepared for tonight’s theme, complete in a purple and black number that she clearly spent either time or money on. It even has subtle accents that light up, committed to her aesthetic.

“Dressed ta the nines tonight,” he compliments, grinning.

“And  _you’re_ sporting a new look as well,” she returns.

Jamie looks down at himself, then back at her, his grin turning awkward.

“I’m sure you’ve seen me wear this before--”

“I mean the look on your face,  _amigo._ ” A long finger pokes him where his bushy brows meet. “As if you’re lost in thought, instead of your usual… hunter’s awareness.” She flings her hand back, then looks him up and down, confirming that yes, he is just as much a flag pole as he always has been. “Though I suppose it was only inevitable that you’d end up… losing your head in the clouds.”

Jamie can’t help it; he giggles heartily at the depreciatory dig at his height. He tilts his head toward her with a wink.  “Alright, ya caught me red-handed.”

“People don’t come here just to stare out over the water. There are cheaper places to do that.  _¿Qué pasa?_ School got you down?”

Of all the people that want to nose into his business, of course it would be Sombra. There is no winning for him in this situation; if she  _really_ wants to know, she  _will_ find out. Better the horse’s mouth than the grapevine. He takes a measured sip of his drink, trying to form words around a concept that he himself has not quite figured out.

“About three or four weeks ago, I had a project for Process Engineering that had us find ancient methods and implement them into a new novel design. I had an idea of what I wanted to do, but I couldn’t find the specifics that I  _knew_ were documented somewhere, not even on the internet--”

Sombra opens her mouth and holds up a finger--

“-- _No_ , Sombra, I’m not going to ask you for help on my  _homework._ ”

She closes her mouth and drops her hand.

“Anyway, I found some books that seemed like pretty likely sources, and I spent a better part of a whole day going from library to library only to end up empty-handed. But I found one on the edge of town--found exactly what I was lookin’ for. The place is owned by this older bloke that helped me find it, and even though I haven’t been there since finishin’ my project, I can’t help but keep thinkin’ about ‘im.”

Sombra shrugs. “So what’s keeping you from working your usual magic on him?”

Jamie internally winces. She knows his secret, so of course she gets pleasure from trying to make him squirm.

“I don’t want to have sex with him,” he starts, but immediately flinches in time with Sombra’s skeptical brow raise. “I mean--I don’t  _just_ want to have sex with him. There’s somethin’ about him. Bloke dresses like a heavy metal concert and got Pachimari on his phone… someone like that has a story, ya know?”

A pause. Then, Sombra waves her hand, and a panel of purple hexagons manifest out of thin air, spinning before locking in place and casting the area in a soft glow. “I can find it out for you,” she offers.

It’s tempting. Sombra has the answers of all the unasked questions of the world at her fingertips with her technomagic, and it would only take her a few minutes to dig up someone’s entire life story. Jamie brings his cigarette up to his mouth and silently considers it. There’s something about it that feels wrong, like cheating at some kind of game, but he doesn’t want to put it that way. He flicks the end of his cigarette with his thumb, as if there were ashes to tap off. The offer goes unanswered, only the vapour he exhales filling the air.

“I get it.” Sombra says softly. “You don’t want… spoilers.”

“I’d want to hear it from him,” he concedes.

“But you’re sitting here, thinking about him, instead of acting on it. Why?”

Jamie tilts his head to the side. “I can come up with all sorts of excuses, but really it’s because he’s not the type that I usually pursue. Older, wiser, put-together. Moreover--I want to spend time with him, go on a  _date_ , and I don’t know if I can trust myself to stay on the narrow and keep myself from tryin’ to end the night in the same bed.”

Sombra taps a nail against her chin in thought, carefully considering his words.  Watching her do that gives him a mild sense of anxiety; Sombra is a plotter, through and through, and her moral compass doesn’t point as north as his does since his falling. He’s as much a potential puppet for her as anyone else, but she at least seems content to trade amicable favours instead of taking advantage of him. “It’s not like you to be scared of failure or trying something new,” she points out.

Jamie holds up his hands as if in surrender the best he can, while holding his drink and electronic cigarette. She’s completely correct. “It’s a new  _feeling._ ”

“What can I do to help?”

He takes his eyes off of the river to look at her. Sombra’s expression is genuine, and with her it’s hard to tell if she’s trying to invest in a favour to call in at a later time or if she really just wants to help. He looks over at the hexagons that provide her with data that only she’s able to make sense of, then back at her.

“Tell me if there’s a reason he might decline.” He doesn’t want the reason itself -- should he already be married, monogamous, or fishing in another pond. “Or if things would get complicated if he didn’t.”

“ _Necesito un nombre._ ”

Jamie looks away, as if to shield himself from the potential reveal. “Mako Rutledge.”

And just like that, she’s on it. The two sit in silence, with exception of the occasional beeps and trills from Sombra’s magic as she sifts through massive amounts of information. At one point, she makes a soft but surprised  _oh_ , soon followed by an even louder, more shocked one. Jamie resists the temptation to turn around. Sombra waves her hand again, dismissing the hexagons with a flurry that dissipates into the air.

“You have nothing to worry about.” He can hear the delighted grin on her face, and he turns to look at it. “And it’s a story you’re really…  _really_ going to want to learn.” A wink.

The news is more relief than cheer, and he’s sure that the difference is apparent in the smile he gives her in return. “I’ll drop by his library this Monday.”

“Then it’s settled.”  Sombra raises her hand and draws the very tips of her nails with a feather-light touch under Jamie’s chin, causing his skin to prickle. “In the meantime, why don’t I give you a reason to take your mind off of it?”

“Oi!” He smirks. “That’s my line.”

“I brought your favourite toys.”

So her presence here  _is_ more than just coincidence, huh? He leans down into her. “Say no more.”

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

“Rutledge,” a thickly Russian-accented voice calls from behind Mako.

He turns to look at Zarya as he finishes pulling his coat over his shoulders, and watches her approach. “Yes?”

“I am going back home for holiday. My flight is in five hours, and I have time to kill. Would you like to have dinner together? My gift.”

If it had been anyone else, Mako would have thought that they were joking -- but he’s seen time and time again that Zarya can out-eat even him. That’s not the part of the offer that seems off to him, though:

“Why your boss? No classmates you’d rather get to know better?”

She laughs in response. “I spend more of my free time here. Besides… I am sure that many have already started their plans.”

Just like her to be a workaholic. “So be it. Got a place in mind?”

“I do! It is out of the way, so I have been looking for a reason to go. Oh--but what is your opinion of sushi?”

“Love it. Fish is the only meat I’ll eat.”

“ _Ax, как хорошо!_ I shall show you there.”

Mako gets on his bike and allows Zarya to lead the way in her car. Much to his surprise, the two of them head back into the Central Business District area, which means that the place she has in mind isn’t exactly on the way to the airport. It really isn’t a choice of convenience, which speaks to the degree that Zarya wanted a reason to visit it. It does mean, however, that Mako will have a shorter drive back this apartment.

The deeper they get into CBD, the more lively the streets get. The crowds are likely people that just got off of work too, and the busy roads give him a sense of home-like security; this dusk-like period is a relatively demon-free hour, and Mako reckons that it’s because people are in higher spirits when they get to go home for the night.

When they get to the restaurant, Mako can recognize it as such without having seen it before. The storefront has a beautiful new-age spin on traditional Japanese storefronts, with neon signs made to look like paper lanterns with the characters 自由. Mako and Zarya work together to find a parking garage nearby and then walk back to the restaurant.

As soon as they walk in, Mako immediately knows that this is not the kind of place he would go to on his own. It’s not that he doesn’t like it -- in fact, he quite likes the new-age motif, it’s just that he’s clearly not part of the intended demographic here.

The majority of the floor is centred around a winding, small conveyor belt carrying sushi and fusion treats, and instead of being strictly a bar like Mako would expect, there are booths that are aligned in perpendicular to the belt. There  _is_ a proper bar, lining the side of the restaurant that is nothing but a glass wall to view the busy sidewalk and street outside. The whole place has low-level, cool-coloured lighting from fixtures under the tables and chairs, with mild studio lighting over the tables. Mako can still see perfectly well, even through his glasses.

They’re welcomed by a young girl that couldn’t possibly be much younger than she has to be in order to serve alcohol; she’s half the height of either Zarya or Mako. She’s dressed in a maid costume in colours ranging from white to medium blue, hair in tightly curled pigtails, and most importantly: doesn’t seem at all intimidated by the size of the restaurant’s most recent patrons.

“Welcome to  _Jiyu!_ Would you like seats at the belt or the bar?”

She’s  _adorable._ Mako dies a little bit on the inside.

“Belt, please,” Zarya requests. The hostess picks up two laminated menus and brings them to a booth, sliding the menus across the surface at their respective spots.

“Have you been here before?”

Both of them shake their head, and she gives them a quick rundown on how belt orders work, then drops off an electric device they can use to call waitstaff when they need it.

“Your waiter will be with you in a moment!”

The two are left to look over what their options are. For a system that seems rather simple, the sheer number of options available makes it feel a little overwhelming, especially when there isn’t a list of what’s already on the belt. They’ll just have to sit and observe; Mako hopes that Zarya really meant it when she said she had time to kill.

“So do you know how much longer you’ll be staying with us?” Mako asks, deciding he needs a break after going through the menu a third time and realising he didn’t know half of the things on it.

“If I play my cards correctly, I should be graduating here,” she answers, beaming. “Two more semesters. I would like to stay here if that is possible; I love this country.”

“It’s no New Zealand,” he jests in return. Even though he means it as a joke, Zarya considers his words for a moment.

“There are not many reasons why you are stuck here,” she argues. “Why do you not return?”

“Trust me, I’ve tried. It’s a beautiful country and I miss it every day… but I’m only reminded of bad memories when I’m there. So when I came back from America, I settled for second best.”

Zarya shrugs. There’s a sound that Mako realises that he can hear in the background, but for as familiar as it feels he can’t seem to place it.  _Ta-tump, ta-tump, ta-tump._

“I can understand that. I saw many beautiful places while in service, but because of… context, I do not think I could view them with fresh eyes.”

Mako nods, and there’s movement in his peripheral that brings both his and Zarya’s attention to the other end of the booth.

The three stare at each other for a moment that transcends awkwardness. Zarya is the first to speak up.

“Jamison! I did not know you worked here.”

Jamie holds up his tablet to his chest. While he’s not dressed in a frilly maid outfit, he  _is_ dressed in clean-pressed clothes: a white button-up rolled up to his elbows and a lap-apron full of notepads, pens, other menus, and additional styluses for his tablet. It’s not the same one he has for personal use -- it matches the ones that other waitstaff are found carrying around, all with that blue and white colour scheme. His dark blue slacks have been modified to cut off just before his prosthetic knee, and the long side hides the edges of his orthopaedic sneaker. It leaves a good impression of this place on Mako--that they’re willing to bend the rules of what could be an oppressive dress code for the comfort of their employees, even if it might be potentially off-putting to close-minded customers. It’s the mentality he he runs his library with, too. Happy employees make for happier patrons.

Even if the place hires demons, a small voice in the back of his mind reminds him.

Meanwhile, Jamie’s eyes flick between Mako and Zarya. On one hand, maybe he doesn’t have to wait for Monday, but he’s not really sure what he’s seeing here. Given the hour, this could just be post-work dinner, but it’s awfully far from the library, so it could be… something else? No, wait, doesn’t Zarya have a girlfriend? This is the exact reason why he chose employment outside of comfortable walking distance from campus -- as much as he loves schmoozing with people, he really doesn’t want to run into classmates, professors, or bedmates while working. With his scattered brain, it poses too much of a distraction. He’s here to work, not to seek and give affection.

“Yeah,” he starts cheerfully, despite his uncertainty. “Been here since this place opened up!”

“I like it,” Mako says. For some reason, Jamie feels exceptionally validated, even though he doesn’t own the place.

“Aw, I’m glad! Can I start you guys with any drinks?”

Both glance down at the menu. Zarya is the first to look back up: “I will have green tea.”

Jamie pulls his tablet from his chest, plucks a tablet stylus from behind his ear, and taps at the screen a few times. “And you, Mako?”

With a sigh, Mako drops his menu. The place has a full bar, but does he really feel like booze right now? “Anything you’d recommend?”

There’s absolutely no hesitation before Jamie’s answer: “Bubble tea!” And then he shyly covers his mouth with the top edge of his tablet: “I mean, if ya want ta try somethin’ different.”

“What  _is_ bubble tea? I’ve heard of it before.”

Jamie leans forward and flips over the menu insert that lists flavour options. Mako notices that his nails are painted with a dark, matte black, similar to how he keeps his own, which wasn’t the case a few weeks ago. “It’s a fruit tea with milk, your choice of flavours -- and you can choose to have tapioca pearls at the bottom, or popping boba, which are little bursts of fruit juice.”

Mako doesn’t really get it, but his curiosity is again leading him down the path of temptation. He’s  _got_ to know what it is about this that has Jamie jumping at the chance to suggest it.

“I’ll have that, then.”

“Rippah, what flavours do you want?”

Mako shrugs. “Make it the way you like it.”

Stars grow in Jamie’s eyes and Mako can see a knife-bladed tail swishing excitedly behind him. “Cheers, I’ll be back in a moment with your drinks!”

Mako watches as he practically hops off, barely a noticeable limp in his step. When he looks back at Zarya, she’s staring at him with a knowing smirk, elbow on the table as she holds up her chin.

“...What’s that look for?”

“Oh,” she says half-dismissively, half-amused. “Ничего.”

He really doesn’t like what her expression implies. “Do you know him? Outside of his visits to the library.”

“Ah, yes. We are both tutors of Russian at university.”

Mako has to resist letting his jaw drop to the floor. “ _Russian?_ How many languages does he know?”

Zarya shrugs. “I do not know  _comprehensive_ list, but I have seen him tutor in…” She starts counting on her fingers. “Russian, Spanish, French, Chinese… I have heard him speak other languages as well. Hindu? Arabic? I am not sure.”

Well, Mako figures, when you live as long as a demon, it gives ample time to learn multiple languages. It puts a little more context on that rant he went on when they first met.

“And yet he’s here, working as a waiter, instead of a translator or interpreter.”

“Maybe he likes it more,” she offers. “He made his prosthetics by hand. I too have wondered why he is attending school for study he already knows. Boy is… what is word… эксцентричен?”

Mako takes a stab in the dark. “Eccentric?”

Zarya beams. “Yes, that is it!”

“I’m starting to think that’s just the tip of the iceberg,” he murmurs under his breath, even though he  _knows_ what’s under the water. But wait, he  _made_ those prosthetics? Zarya has a point, what is the point of going to school when he’s already got the skills and/or talent?

Meanwhile, in the kitchen, a half-finished cup of bubble tea topples over and spills all over the counter. “ _Shit!_ ” Jamie hisses, and one of the maids rushes to come his aid with paper towels.

“Jamie, are you okay?” she asks, handing him a wad of towels. “You’re actin’ like you just found out the sky’s about to fall.”

“Soz, it’s--there’s a bloke in my section that I’ve been...” he trails off, unsure exactly how to end the sentence.

She gives him an arched brow and leaves the counter to look out at the dining area, then dives back in. “Holy dooley, Jamie, he’s twice your age!” she chastises back at him.

 _Actually he’s only a fraction of mine,_ he’s tempted to retort. Instead, he says “I  _know_ that, Katie,” trying to make it sound like the whole point.

“And he’s on a date with someone else,” she adds.

“He’s not,” he corrects. “I know for a fact she’s only into women. They work together.”

“You’re insatiable,” she decides, grabbing more paper towels for the mess. It’s the only accurate thing she’s said about the matter, and Jamie starts mixing a new bubble tea once the mess is picked up. For what it’s worth, his timing is perfect -- by the time it’s done, the green tea has heated up too, and he sets up the cup and teapot on the tray while the bubble tea is in the heat-seal machine. He retrieves the drink and pulls a Sharpie marker from his apron pocket, uncaps it, and… pauses right before he writes the order on the lid. After about two seconds worth of consideration, he writes something else instead, then heads over to their booth.

“So,” he says, delivering their respective drinks to the table. His heart is in his throat, but he tries to keep cool. “Do you have any orders for the kitchen?”

“Would you recommend chicken ramen?” Zarya asks. He doesn’t mind talking to her -- it’s easier to keep his mind on the job. Neither of them seem to have noticed the message on the lid of Mako’s bubble tea, who is currently enjoying a belt plate of crunchy ebi roll.

“Of course! Big portion, you’ll love it. I can even get ya some extra eggs in it if ya don’t mind a little up-charge.”

“You know me too well, Jamison.”

“I’ll take that as a yes then,” he says, tucking the now-empty tray under his arm and pulling out his tablet to mark down the order. Trying to avoid skipping a beat, he turns to Mako. “Anything for you?”

“Steamed vegetable bao,” he answers succinctly, after swallowing his current piece of sushi. “Half dozen.” To start, at least -- he needs to make sure that he likes them.

“Right-o!” Jamie taps on the tablet again. “If you need me in the meantime, just tap the light and I’ll be back in a tic.”

Jamie leaves to take care of another table, leaving Zarya and Mako once again on their lonesome to discover what he’d left for Mako. He picks up the plastic cup in his hands, looking at the lid -- which also catches Zarya’s attention. That knowing smirk from earlier returns to her face.

“I knew it.”

It’s a phone number.

“Has he done this before?” Mako asks, turning the sealed cup to the side to watch the tapioca bubbles gather at the bottom corner. He thinks he’s starting to understand… the drink, at least.

“Yes. I have lost count of how many times he has propositioned someone. Myself included.”

 _Oh,_ Mako thinks grimly.  _Now_ ** _he’s_  ** _starting to make sense._

“He is… respectful,” she offers. “In spite of his tenacity. I am surprised he has not found companion.”

“What do you mean, respectful?”

“I had rescinded his attentions, as I am in relationship. He apologised and did not bring it up again. It is more than I can say for many of his type.”

 _Or maybe not._ Mako hums in understanding, even though it destroys what he thought he knew. If Jamie was trying to find his sustenance through promiscuous relations with humans, then why would he bother with courtship? What’s even more confusing is that, if Zarya is telling the truth, why would a demon care for a human’s consent? If he’s part of the  _Lilin_ family, he wouldn’t  _need_ it -- he’d just take what he came for and move on.

“Are you going to call him?” Zarya asks. Mako realises he’s been staring at the number with a frown this entire time. Mako sighs and pulls out his phone.

_This is why they say curiosity killed the cat._

He can’t help it. He loves a good mystery. Even if this leads to his death… well, he can at least say he lived a long, fulfilling life. He opens his contact list and inserts the number under the name  _Jamie Fawkes._

“I did not realise he was your type.”

“I’m not sure I have a type,” he answers honestly, saving the contact entry and putting his phone away without sending a message. Mako picks up the boba straw and investigates it, figuring it out from the puzzle pieces he’s been left. The sharp end of the straw makes a satisfying  _pop_ when he punctures the lid. He sucks up the half-sweet milk tea, only mildly startled when a small number of black tapioca end up in his mouth, chewy and sweet. It’s not bad.

One hour later, the two of them have raked up a literal tower of plates and bowls. By the time they’re full, the place is absolutely crawling with twenty-somethings and the alcohol is flowing, turning a calm, quiet restaurant into a chaotic place full of cheer and laughter. Mako feels a little pang of sympathy when it takes longer for Jamie to come between calls while still maintaining a lighthearted and energetic interaction, but the truth is that Jamie doesn’t mind. The mayhem brings a sense of focus to his scatterbrained method, getting his mind off of his fixation.

To finish up the night, Jamie returns with a receipt and an extra bubble tea that Mako didn’t ask for. “A roadie,” he explains with a wink, “on the house.” It’s the least he can do when the two of them have basically paid for a quarter of this month’s rent.

As Zarya and Mako take their leave of the restaurant, Mako looks down at the cup before he punctures the lid.

It’s a doodle of Pachimari.

Mako can’t help but smile to himself.


	3. III

_ This is the beginning of your conversation history. _

 

**Mako**

_ 10:37 April 8 _

Hey Jamie. This is Mako.

 

**Jamie**

_ 10:48 _

Oh hey! Gday!!

How are you going??

 

**Mako**

_ 10:48 _

Doing alright.

You wanted to talk?

 

**Jamie**

_ 10:49 _

LOL right to the point I see!!

Actually I wanted to ask you out on a date. ;P

 

**Mako**

_ 10:53 _

A date.

How do you know I’m not married?

Or straight?

 

**Jamie**

_ 10:54 _

Well

How this usually goes

This is the point where you tell me that you’re straight, or married

_ 11:02 _

Or not interested

 

**Mako**

_ 11:05 _

Zarya tells me you’re actively dating around school.

Why me?

 

**Jamie**

_ 11:05 _

Have you looked in the mirror recently?

You’re the coolest thing since hard rock.

 

**Mako**

_ 11:06 _

Really?

The last time someone commented on my appearance, they said…

If I can remember it correctly

The word “edgelord” was used?

 

**Jamie**

_ 11:07 _

Okay. Ouch.

I’m really sorry about that

That was before I knew you were a pachimaniac!

I mean…

As soon as I saw you I was like “this guy is not to be fucked with”

Your ink is cool. Your style is cool.

The fact that you wear sunglasses everywhere is sub-zero

But if

_ 11:08 _

Like

If you were gonna be one of those arseholes that’s all like

Hurr burr only stuff I like is cool

And young kids and their dumb fads are ruining our culture

That was going to be super fucking lame

So all of his tats and clothes are all for show then isn’t it

So yeah

That impression didn’t last for long

The fact that you like Pachimari only makes you cooler.

 

**Mako**

_ 11:17 _

Haha.

It’s okay, Jamie.

Of all the things I’ve been called in my life, “edgelord” is the least worst of them all.

 

**Jamie**

_ 11:19 _

Oh

So you just wanted to watch me squirm then

Or you’re at work

 

**Mako**

_ 11:20 _

A little from column A.

A little from column B.

But mostly the latter.

I have lunch in an hour though.

We can talk itinerary then.

 

**Jamie**

_ 11:22 _

!!!

So that’s a yes?

 

**Mako**

_ 11:22 _

As long as your date ideas don’t suck.

I’ll message you when I’m off.

My days off this week are Wednesday and Thursday.

 

**Jamie**

_ 11:23 _

That’s subjective…

I’ll do my best!

 

**Mako**

_ 12:34 _

Alright, I’m free. Lay it on me.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:36 _

Oh hey!

Okay, so...I’m not sure what you consider a date that doesn’t suck so I made a pretty long list:

Museum(s)

The aquarium

Karaoke

Music lounge

Nature hike

Animal shelter

Mini golf

Arcade (with laser tag!!!)

Dinner and a movie

Mix and match your choice?

 

**Mako**

_ 12:40 _

Hooley dooley.

I like that afterthought “dinner and a movie”.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:42 _

Figured I’d might as well

For all I know your idea of a fun date is sitting around

Let the record state that I do not leave any stone unturned

 

**Mako**

_ 12:43 _

You certainly didn’t.

“Animal shelter”?

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:43 _

Yeah!

 

**Mako**

_ 12:43 _

As a date?

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:44 _

Yeah!!!

 

**Mako**

_ 12:45 _

You’ll have to explain this one to me.

I don’t think either of us are in places where we can get a pet.

Even if we did it would be rather…

Domestic?

For a first date.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:48 _

Oh!

I get what you’re saying.

Okay, so the deal with that one is that there’s a shelter I volunteer at

There’s all sorts of things we can do

And they’re always looking for strong folks to do some of the harder, heavier stuff ;)

They don’t pay but in exchange you get to hang out in the playroom with the animals ‘til your heart’s content

 

**Mako**

_ 12:54 _

Huh.

I like the sound of that.

Do some good for the community and hang out with animals?

Count me in.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:56 _

Awesome!

Since we’re planning this ahead of time, I can let them know we’re coming so they might prep some pretty cool tasks for us to do.

Wanna pick something else in case it’s a rainy day?

Or something to do after?

 

**Mako**

_ 13:00 _

Dinner and a movie?

I imagine I’ll work up an appetite.

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:02 _

LOL and after all that shit talk too

I snorted out my tea

Yeah we can do that!

If you let me pick the movie, you can pick the dinner

Deal?

 

**Mako**

_ 13:04 _

Not a chance to put it to a vote?

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:04 _

Nope!

Well

If you really don’t want to see it you can tell me

But I’ve really wanted to see Irene for a while

And I hate going to the theatre by myself

 

**Mako**

_ 13:10 _

An animation.

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:11 _

Had to look it up?

 

**Mako**

_ 13:11 _

Yeah.

Think the theatre is gonna be okay with that?

Letting two grown men into a kid’s film?

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:13 _

Have you ever been forcibly removed from a movie before?

 

**Mako**

_ 13:14 _

Only by myself.

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:14 _

I’m already loving your taste in humour.

It’s a date then!

Let me get that appointment set up.

 

_ 13:25 _

10am on Wednesday work for you?

 

**Mako**

_ 13:26 _

Yeah. I’ll pick you up.

Wait, are you okay with motorcycles?

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:27 _

Crikey he has a bike too.

Oops I meant to send that to someone else…

Yeah I like motorcycles.

I’ll send you the coordinates to pick me up sometime later today.

OH!

And don’t forget to wear something you don’t mind getting ruined.

Just in case they have us doing dirty deeds

 

**Mako**

_ 13:29 _

Hah.

Alright, I’ll see you then.

I’ve gotta get back to work.

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:31 _

Okay!

Hope it goes smoothly

If you get bored I’ll be here

Doing nothing but playing games and smoking

 

**Mako**

_ 13:32 _

Stay out of trouble.

 

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

 

It’s warmer than it was earlier in the week, bringing the typical mild temperature back to the city. Jamie is dressed the same despite the change in weather, having learned hard lessons from the few times he’s ridden on motorcycles in the past. The hoodie he has on is thick but ratty, damaged from stories he likely won’t share on a first date, and his jeans are in a similar state. Thankfully, both of them are free from holes, so he doesn’t look like he just woke up off the street.

His hood is pulled up over his head as he waits for his ride to arrive at the campus bus stop, hands stuffed into his kangaroo pocket, idly fidgeting with each other. He lets out an exhale and it shudders with anxiety. Jamie breaks his fixation to bend down and undo the clasp around his ankle, unfurling the string of beads and the medallion hanging from them. Reaching into his hoodie with both ends, he re-clasps it behind his neck, then pulls the medallion up and drops it in his hoodie and tank top underneath. His hand presses against his chest, feeling the cold surface of the medallion press against his sternum. With measured breaths, he brings himself back to the middle. Jamie doesn’t know how much time passes from when he starts meditating to when his concentration is broken by an unmistakable sound of a motorcycle engine, but however long it was, it was long enough to get him to calm down.

It all gets undone as soon as he looks up to see the machine and her driver. It’s not just a bike, it’s a  _ chopper _ , and Mako most definitely invested a lot of time -- or money -- or  _ both _ \-- into her. Jamie stands up from his seat on the bench and pulls his hood down to stare.

_ He must get a lot of shit for making a Mad Max prop, _ he thinks to himself. Mako isn’t doing any favours for himself by wearing a leather jacket that has spikes on the shoulders, and not just the kid-safe kind found in more readily-accessible boutiques. His hair bun is decorated with sticks made from bone which are decorated in copper wire and translucent beads. While Jamie avoided going for the ripped-jeans look, the same can’t be said for Mako.

“Morning,” Mako calls over the idling thrum.

“G’morbike,” Jamie fumbles. Mako arches an eyebrow. Jamie slaps his hand over his face. Is it too late to go back to bed? His thoughts are immediately interrupted when something hard is thrust into his chest, and he peeks through his fingers to see the helmet that’s been presented to him.

“I didn’t come here to clean your jaw off the pavement,” Mako says. Jamie swallows to try to push his heart back to where it belongs, takes the helmet, and slips it over his head.

Mako hates it. He hates how this irredeemable fiend is so tied up in his honesty that he’s constantly tripping over himself for it. Maybe he’ll get some answers eventually, but for now he has no choice but to begrudgingly adore it, even as Jamie mounts the back seat of the bike and takes a hold of his sides. He tenses at the contact, but he reminds himself that if Jamie is the kind of demon family he thinks he is, the only thing he has to be afraid of is a  _ lot _ more subtle than raw strength or sleight of hand.

He kicks off the bike and the takeoff has Jamie pressing into his back. Even knowing what he does, it’s going to take some time to be comfortable with this.

The animal shelter that they arrive at a few minutes later is sandwiched between the city and the suburban sprawl. It’s a large and attractive facility, one massive wall covered in a cheerful mural of a variety of animals having a great time with a diverse cast of humans. Mako stops in a parking spot in the rather unbusy lot, allowing Jamie to get off first.

He’s a little unsteady at first, but once he gets his balance he hands the helmet back to Mako, who puts it back.

“Been a while?” he asks.

“At least a year,” Jamie responds. “Hoping ya weren’t gonna notice…”

Mako chuckles as they head towards the shelter. “I can spot someone green from a mile away, Jamie. Don’t worry about it.”

“I thought you were angry at me.”

Mako is confused for a second, mentally rewinding the ride here, until he remembers that he  _ did  _ flinch at Jamie’s touch earlier after giving him a bit of sass. “Nah. Just itching to get out of campus traffic.” It’s a little bit of a lie, but he’s much more content to keep the truth to himself.

Jamie giggles. “Yeah, I know that feeling.”

Intake goes fairly quickly. Mako, as a newcomer, has to be given a short orientation, and the full-time staff trust veteran Jamie to teach him the rest of the ropes. First on the docket: spays and neuters. There are two veterinarians in the shelter today, and Jamie and Mako are tasked with the job of running conscious animals into the operation room, then returning unconscious weight back to their kennels. The day’s only begun, but it hardly feels like a date since Jamie and Mako only see each other when they pass in the hall.

The second task is more date-like. Both of them are given the job of cleaning out the cages of the bird room. Both of them had shed their outer clothing about a third of the way through the neuter and spay circuit, leaving Jamie in an exceptionally loose-fitting and thin tank top that exposes his absolutely ripped  _ serratus _ muscles when he holds his arms a certain way. Mako is in a paint- and wood stain-splattered plain grey t-shirt that lost its ability to stretch a few years ago, so what used to be form-fitting now drapes under the widest portion of his belly.

The bird room is home to a handful of bonded budgies, one cockatoo, and two Jenday conures. It’s the least populated section of the shelter, much to Jamie’s bittersweet surprise. Like his fellow volunteers, there’s always a little bit of a selfish desire to keep seeing the same faces every time you show up, but it doesn’t take long to remind oneself that they may have found their forever home with a family that can dedicate all their time to them.

“My snowy little girl is still waiting fer her perfect family, oi?” he asks to the cockatoo as he pulls her out from her cage. As she perches on his prosthetic wrist, Jamie rubs at her beak.  She loves the attention and indicates it with a few happy chirrups. Mako simply watches, awed that such spiritually sensitive creatures are unhesitantly delighted to indulge in proximity and affection from a demon. In the split second he considers that maybe his understanding of them might be wrong, Jamie hoists the cockatoo up to his shoulder and she immediately takes to trying to preen at the base of one of his horns. He doesn’t seem to take notice of this, but then again -- it probably just looks like regular hair preening to anyone else.

“What’s wrong?” Jamie asks, when he notices that Mako has been staring. “Not used to birds?”

“Yeah…” He can at least be honest with this one. “I’ve never held a bird before.”

“Oh! Let’s give ya the budgies then. The Jendays will nip if they sense fear.”

He doesn’t know if he’d call it  _ fear _ exactly, but before he can even voice the protest, his hands are filling with tiny little colourful birds as quickly as Jamie can gleefully chirp “Step up! Step up!” at them. Mako’s hands are massive enough to hold the entire family, some fingers holding two at a time, and they all seem quite content to hang out there, calmly chittering amongst themselves.

“They’re very sweet,” Mako comments.

“They are, ain’t they? I bet they’ll go real quick once someone comes lookin’ for a flock. Not like my little spoiled princess Cinderella!” Jamie makes kissing noises at the cockatoo, who flares her crest a little at hearing her name.

“I take it she’s been here for a while?”

“Yeah. Her mummy died--lived a full life, she did--and put Cinderella in her will to be given to her daughter and son-in-law. They took care of her for a few years, got preggers, and nine months later, we all find out Cindy ain’t too fond of little humans.”

“That’s a shame,” Mako says. Cinderella is at attention, as if she knows they’re talking about her, even though Jamie’s attention is directed towards the Jendays as he commands them to step up on his hand.

“Yeah. By this point she’s bonded to the volunteers and staff here, she’s gonna be hard to adopt out ta anyone except experts.”

“You seem fond of her in return,” he points out.

“Sure, sure. But I can’t own a pet; dorm doesn’t want ‘em, and I’m not home enough fer it ta be a responsible decision.” With two birds in hand, Jamie turns to the transport cages that will do for temporary places to keep the birds while they clean the cages. Mako follows, if mostly because he doesn’t know how to transfer his handfuls of tiny birds.

“That’s… insightful. Especially for someone of your age.” Mako eyes Jamie carefully, seeking some kind of a reaction--but he doesn’t get one, other than a shrug.

“I like animals, but I’ve never been able to afford one. In order to fulfil the desire for that kind of interaction, I started volunteerin’, and… that’s a really common reason for pets to be surrendered here, whether or not they realise it.” The Jendays take to the new cage without much complaint, and Jamie moves onto the larger cage for Cinderella. “Like dogs who tear up the house and the owners think it’s an uncontrollable misbehaviour.” Once Cinderella is safely in her temporary cage, he turns to Mako. “Need some help?”

“Yeah.”

Jamie quickly realises the reason why: Mako’s hands are too big to fit into the cage opening. Or rather, too big to fit him  _ and _ the birds in it. Jamie lets out a good-nature giggle and helps transfer the flock one or two at a time. “So, what about you?” he asks.

“Same reason,” Mako replies. “Well, to be specific, the only animal I care to own would be cramped in a studio apartment.”

“Yeah? What’s that?”

“A pig.”

Jamie immediately coos out in delight. It comes as a surprise to Mako.

“Ain’t never met a pet pig that wasn’t the sweetest, cutest thing! They’d suit ya for sure!”

Mako gives Jamie a wry smile. “No other reason, huh?"

The last of the budgies are put into their cage and Jamie turns to look at him. The two of them stand in silence as Jamie scans him up and down, a thorn instantly driven under his skin at the implication Mako is trying to make.

“Bit early in the relationship ta tease like that, oi?” Jamie responds with a measured line-thin mouth before moving past Mako towards the utility room. In light of Jamie’s sour reception, Mako smiles.

“I appreciate the intent to avoid the low-hanging fruit,” he explains as he follows, “but I’m not sensitive about my weight.”

By the time they reach the utility room, Jamie still hasn’t responded. Mako can see that his tail is down, curled around his upper thigh defensively. As he picks out a bucket and fills it with hot water, the silence between them grows exponentially more awkward.

“... Jamie?”

“I’m not sensitive about my amputation either,” he hisses, once he realises Mako won’t drop it. “But that doesn’t make it okay when someone wants to make me the butt of a joke.” His tail swishes violently, then curls around his other thigh.

Mako feels his heart swell at the sentiment. He’d left the door wide open to test the waters, and the results are a lot more surprising than he’d expected. No wonder the animals here trust him so much. Mako throws a glance behind him to make sure the hall is empty, before turning back to the other. He’s currently preoccupied with grabbing supplies from the shelving.

“It’s alright, Jamie. My personal policy’s always been: if you’re laughing  _ with _ them…”

He lifts his shirt up. Jamie turns around and drops a bottle of dish detergent into the bucket with a PLOP.

“They can’t laugh  _ at  _ you.”

“Oh my  _ God, _ Mako!” Jamie bursts out in delighted laughter. Like the tattoos on his arms, the ink on his stomach has faded into his skin, but  _ unlike _ the others, the depiction is rather cartoony--a cheeky pig-face that implements Mako’s natural outie navel as a snout, over a backdrop of flames and piston cylinders. A banner reads: WILD HOG POWER.

Just as Jamie thinks he’s starting to get over it, he starts cackling again. Mako wears a shit-eating smirk and takes an exaggerated step forward, causing his belly to jiggle dramatically and pushing Jamie so far that he has to gasp to get air back into himself. He doesn’t exactly collapse, but he finds that his legs are too weak to hold himself up any longer an he slowly drops down on his ass and nearly toppling the bucket, hand over a diaphragm that is aching for him to stop, but he just can’t.

And this is the guy he called an  _ edgelord! _

Here he is, some seven-foot tall and probably weighing quarter a tonne, packed with muscle thick enough to show through the fat, looking like someone that could snap another human’s neck as easily as  ripping paper, dressing as if he could commune with demons or order a hit on someone, and he’s got a  _ god damn cartoon pig tattooed on his stomach.  _ Jamie falls backwards, practically laying on the floor of the utility room as his laughter gets even more intense even though the air is already being choked out of him. Tears well up in the corners of his eyes as he pictures this diesel truck of a man walking into a tattoo shop over the duration of likely several  _ weeks _ just to have that level of meticulous planning and designing and artistry go into a giant tattoo of a cartoon pig.

Mako feels a chuckle bubble up through his chest. The demon’s laughter is absolutely infectious, but he hadn’t meant it to go this far. “Jamie?” he calls out, pulling his shirt back down. He offers a hand down at him. “You okay?” he manages to get out, but not without that chuckle finally escaping.

Jamie takes a moment to calm himself down and is at least half successful as he reaches out to take Mako’s hand. He doesn’t even need to pull himself up at all--Mako is strong enough to pull him up with one arm alone-- but by the time Jamie manages to sit up, there’s an unsettling  _ snap  _ that sends a shock of terror up Mako’s spine. Jamie falls back down, uproarious laughter starting all over again.

Mako is left standing with a limp prosthesis in his hand.

It’s finally what breaks his resolve. Mako joins Jamie in laughing, though not quite as recklessly since he knows he can’t laugh too hard, else he’ll run the risk of having difficulty getting his air back. He tosses the prosthetic back at Jamie and it hits him in the chest; Jamie gasps down just enough air to say a weak “Ow” before going back to laughing. Since Jamie is busy losing his mind on the floor, Mako has to reach over and turn off the water before the bucket overflows.

“That’s what ya get fer makin’ me feel like I was walkin’ into a trap,” Jamie comments when he can. The amount he needs to concentrate to get his prosthetic back on is enough of a distraction to finally get him to breathe again, albeit through some hearty chuckles.

“I’ll make sure not to do it again,” Mako says, but his smirk says otherwise. 

“I’ll take ya at yer word.” Jamie meets the smirk, then pushes himself back upright. He fetches the wet detergent bottle out of the bucket, then picks up a few scrubbing brushes. “Take care of the bucket, will ya? I’ll grab the other stuff.”

Mako nods and does as requested, leading the charge back to the bird room. Cinderella squawks a greeting at them, but she gets ignored in lieu of making a beeline to the dirty cages. It’s not pretty or graceful work, but they were in need of upkeep bad enough to make the finished product satisfying to look at after all the scrubbing and chipping and sanitising. The two of them work in a relatively comfortable silence with the exception of what’s needed to get the job done, until Mako thinks of something that had been eating at him in passing:

“Do you usually bring people here for dates?”

It seems too perfect, at least for the two of them. A shared passion and charitable to boot? It’s a nice departure from the usual, like idle shared time or thinly veiled interviews. It’s more natural, like friends hanging out.

Jamie laughs nervously as he places a door back on its hinges and tests it to make sure it seated properly. “Actually, I haven’t been on a proper date since hhh..” He pauses, suddenly unsure of himself, tilting his head to the side. “Hhhhhhigh school?”

Mako pauses from his scrubbing to look at Jamie. “But Zarya said that you’re always asking people out…?”

“Oh, that’s um, haha…” Jamie fidgets nervously. He wasn’t planning for Zarya to bring it up with Mako, wasn’t planning to have to talk about this so early on, but he might as well since it’s inevitable. Sooner or later, it’s a talk they have to have.

“Not on…” He points a weak finger, hunched forward shyly and his tail between his legs. “... Dates.”

Mako raises his brow wordlessly. After an awkward silence, Jamie lets his posture go slack with a sigh, and he pushes himself upright to put the cage back in place, a convenient reason to not give eye contact. “I sleep around a lot. I’d call ‘em one-night stands, but I have too many coming back for seconds ta call it that.”

Mako hands Jamie a freshly scrubbed cage to sanitise and towel dry. Frankly, none of this comes as a surprise to him, but he has to act like this is news that a totally normal human just told him. He punctures the air with a quick “So…” but doesn’t have the words to follow it up with. For what it’s worth, it does cut through the awkwardness, so that they’re just not standing around in the lull of a lurching conversation.

“Do you dislike dating?” he decides on, as Jamie sits back down on the ground with the cage.

“Nah. Just don’t get those bites as much.”

“Why not? Surely what appeals to others for a fling would be enough for a date.”

“You’d think,” Jamie says with a shrug. “But the truth is, I put on an awful lot of airs, depending on who it is. I’m really good at knowing what someone is looking for, so I play that part for them.”

“Don’t you feel like that’s deceptive?” Mako knows the irony in his question--after all, his entire appearance is a deception.

“I don’t feel that it is. Ya can cook a steak a million different ways ta order with spices and methods, but a steak is still a steak. Problem is…” Jamie casts a somber smile up at Mako. “... less people stick around the table when the steak is just grill-cooked ta rare.”

Mako watches Jamie carefully. Not a single tick or tell to indicate that he’s lying or even twisting the truth. Does he mean to imply that his true form is the rare steak? Or is it more subtle than that?

“I’m sorry,” Jamie says, looking down and shaking his head. “This is paintin’ me in a terrible light…”

“Nah, it’s fine.” Maybe if it had been anyone else, just any stranger, this news would be jarring, but it only confirms what he’d been suspecting since dinner at  _ Jiyu. _ “I was known to chase a bit of tail before I moved here.”

“Really?”

Jamie is more intrigued than shocked, which comes as a relief to Mako. Usually he gets the latter. As fun as it is to catch people off-guard...there’s a time and place.

“Yeah. I probably wasn’t as...prolific as you are, but some people are real weak for the big guy being sweet on ‘em.”

Jamie giggles. Yeah, he can see that. He  _ wants _ to be in that scenario, but he can’t push it. There’s no doubt in his mind that the true, genuine  _ sweet big guy _ only comes out when Mako really wants it to. “No longer, though? Ya ‘grow out of it’ or somethin’?”

Mako lets out an achy, groaning sigh. “That’s part of it. My social circle shrank when I moved, and the people of my generation are more interested in finding a father figure for their kids these days instead of a romp. Sometimes it feels like the opportunity to start something from the beginning passed me by when I was busy with other things.”

Crap. He didn’t mean to pour out his heart like this. This is all information that could very well be used against him…

“Well, fer what it’s worth, I don’t care about the age gap,” Jamie offers.

“I figured. I didn’t think you were asking me out on a date out of ill will.” He means it too, even if he still wants to keep Jamie at a skeptical, healthy arm’s distance away. Mako hands the last of the cleaned cages to Jamie once he puts back the one he finished.

“Where’d ya move from, anyway?”

“America. Southern California.”

“ _ Oooh _ ,” Jamie croons. “ _ That’s _ why ya talk like yer not from around here! I had no idea ya were American.”

“I’m not. Born and raised in New Zealand, moved out to America to start my own business, then moved here when I couldn’t get my work visa renewed. Never got a green card. Figured I’d retire early by moving back down under. Turns out I wasn’t fond of retirement life, so I spent some savings on a library that was about to be shut down to give me something else to work on."

“Huh. I  _ was _ wondering how ya could afford all them fancy clothes on a librarian’s salary.”

Mako chuckles. “That’s because I don’t.” Jamie giggles in return.

With the last cage finished, the two of them leave to tidy up the cleaning supplies and return to allow the birds back into their homes. The Jendays in particular seem quite happy to have a clean cage, and Cinderella wants to play. Jamie gives her a firm ‘no’ and insists that Malachai, her trainer, will be there to play with her in a few minutes. While they work on re-caging the budgies, one of the staff members drops by to tell them that the cat play room is available for them to drop by any time.

“You can go on ahead,” Mako says to Jamie, “I’m gonna go wash up.”

“You got it!” he chirps, and Mako takes off down the opposite direction of the hall. Jamie wastes no time in getting acquainted with the new selection of cats in need of socialisation in the playroom. 

When Mako drops by, he opens the sliding glass door to the large, open room and finds Jamie laying on the floor, absolutely covered in cats. A fluffy ginger one has brazenly curled up directly on his chest, another tortoiseshell around his head, a white and grey-spotted putting her head under his flesh hand to get pet, and a young shorthair ginger playing with the shoelaces on his sneaker.

“Help,” Jamie begs halfheartedly when Mako shows up. “I’m drowning in pussy!”

Mako smirks, but before he can manage to say anything, there’s a bit of movement in the distance. Out of a cube-house crawls a slim, black odd-eyed cat, greyed around the muzzle and eyes with age. She slinks backwards, paws reached out to stretch out her front legs, then pushing up on her shoulders to stretch the back, jaw opened in yawn. Once she finishes her stretches, she looks directly into Mako’s eyes, even through his pitch-black lenses.

Mako feels ice chill down his arms. “You alright?” Jamie asks when he gets no response, but the other seems too lost in thought to respond. The odd-eyed cat, without breaking eye contact with Mako, sits down and wraps her tail around her feet. Mako takes a few steps into the room, slides the door closed, and even though no words are being spoken, he instinctively obeys the request to sit on his haunches with his hands on his knees.

The black cat chirrups in approval as she raises back up, then trots over to Mako. Tail high up in the air, she takes a slow, calculated circle around him, as he sits still to allow her the chance to inspect him.

“Oh,” Jamie says quietly, as she turns into his peripheral and he turns his head to watch. “Someone’s taken interest in you.”

She comes to a stop in front of him and presses the side of her face into the back of Mako’s knuckles. The demand is quite clear, and Mako doesn’t hesitate to lift his hand and run his thick fingers over her lithe head.

“She’s not usually so affectionate with strangers,” Jamie comments in awe. “She acts like she knows you…”

“What’s her name?”

“Moira.”

It seems like an appropriate name, but Mako can’t put a finger on why that might be. “Why is she here? I would think a cat like this would be highly sought after.”

“People don’t like adopting older cats,” Jamie says, with a shrug. “We don’t know how old she is, but the vets put her at a rough sixteen.”

She  _ looks _ like a sixteen-year old cat, but Mako thinks that the truth is she’s probably a lot older. Moira is content to absorb any and all affection that Mako’s willing to give her, running a hand just as large as she is down her spine several times. She takes a few steps towards Jamie, who rolls over--the ginger fleeing before she gets tossed to the side--so that he can wrap an arm around Moira in a half-hug. She accepts the gesture, laying down beside him. Mako watches with keen interest; surely Jamie knows that the creature in his grip has the power to gravely wound him  _ at least _ , even if right now she’s more interested in sniffing at his chin. The cold nose makes Jamie giggle.

And, surely, she knows better about  _ anything _ than Mako does. Jamie has shown himself to be practically harmless, and Moira acts like he really is. Mako lets out a sigh. Animals have always had a wisdom and perception beyond that of humans. He’d never been led astray by an animal before, so he’ll defer to her judgment.

“She’s sweet. Makes me second-guess my decision not to have pets,” Mako admits.

“She’s no pig,” Jamie teases.

“No, but black cats bring good luck.”

“You believe in that, huh?” Jamie asks, bringing his eyes up to Mako. There’s a mischievous little twinkle in his eyes. “Ya superstitious?”

“That’s one way to say it.” Nope. Nope. Abort mission. He doesn’t even want to  _ tempt _ this line of conversation. “But it’s not something I’m comfortable with talking about on a first date.”

Jamie immediately recoils, frowning. As much as he wants to dig into what makes Mako tick, it wasn’t worth putting him in an awkward place.  “Ah, sorry about that, mate. Didn’t mean ta make it weird.”

Moira flops onto her side, exposing her midline in a show of comfort. Mako has to invade Jamie’s personal space to give her chin scratches, but neither of them mind it.

“It’s alright.”

“How’s this for a topic change then: what were you doing for business back in America?”

“Ah.” Jamie knows he’s made the right decision when Mako just starts smiling to himself. “You know the bike sitting out in the parking lot?”

Jamie’s interest is already spiked. “Yeah?”

“I made that -- and many other machines like it -- from the ground up.”

Jamie gasps, startling the tortoiseshell next to him, who quickly calms down once he realises nothing happened. “ _ No, _ ” he whispers. He can absolutely believe that Mako made his own chopper… but there are  _ others, _ too? He made a  _ whole business _ out of it?

“Yes,” Mako retorts, still smirking, then reaches into his back pocket to retrieve his phone. He flips through a few screens before handing it to Jamie. “Whole album here full of my favourites.”

Jamie takes the phone and props himself up on his arm to scroll through the pictures. Each one of them is a beautiful beast -- sometimes accompanied by Mako, dressed in stained mechanic’s clothes and overalls, sometimes accompanied by all sorts of different people that Jamie can only assume are the people that bought them. Mako, meanwhile, picks up a pole with a feather toy dangling at the end of it, successfully distracting the young kitten previously preoccupied with Jamie’s shoestrings with it.

After a while of Jamie going through a seemingly endless collection of pictures and stopping on a few of them to really take in the details, only disturbed by Moira standing up and walking away (but not without very intentionally rubbing the end of her back against Jamie’s face in the process), he looks up at Mako and hands back the phone.

“You  _ retired?  _ From  _ that? _ ”

Mako chuckles. “On paper. Remember, I got kicked out of America. As majority shareholder, I still own the company, and hired the appropriate manpower to replace all the clerical stuff I got tired of doing. But now I’m a consultant, working on commission, designing as a hobby in my free time.”

“Hooley dooley,” Jamie comments, finally sitting up. “Ya must be  _ loaded. _ ”

Mako shrugs a shoulder. “I can afford the things I want.”

“How modest.” Jamie grins. “More than I make as a waiter.”

Mako turns to the other. Well, since he brought it up… “This might be forward of me, but I think you’re working well below your skill set.”

Jamie frowns and looks down. He crosses his legs as best as he can, and Moira helps herself to nesting in the hole he creates. “... I know that.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I’ve always had trouble finding work. Only one interviewer explained to me… I have all the skills and knowledge--” Jamie holds out his prosthetic arm as example “--but absolutely no work experience. No one wants to hire me for the entry level, because I talk too much and intimidate the interviewers with what I know.”

Mako huffs out a laugh, and immediately follows it up with a murmured “sorry.  I’d hire you for Rutledge Customs if I had a say in it any longer.”

Wait.

Would he  _ really _ hire a demon?

Mako looks over at Jamie and when he sees that delighted smile on his face, he confirms yeah, he probably would by now. Probably not right off the bat...which is why he’s not making any good interview impressions. Mako wouldn’t have hired Jamie based on their first interaction -- not by a long shot -- but now that he’s starting to get to know him, the more he’s convinced that not only is he extremely competent, intelligent, and honest… he really does seem like he’s just trying to live as much like a human as possible, whatever the reason for that might be.

“Hey, cheers.”

“I know it doesn’t amount to much--”

“Nah, nah mate, it still means somethin’ ta me. I’d love ta work on machines like that.”

Mako returns a smile of his own, before returning his attention to the cats, as does Jamie. The conversation takes a lighter turn as more cats come out of their shells to greet the strangers, and Jamie introduces Mako to each and every one that he knows, barring a few new faces. Neither of them are concerned with cat scratches or bites, so they let the cats crawl and play all over them, having to break up a few fights when things get too exciting.

Between the animal shuttling, cage cleaning, and playing with the cats, Jamie and Mako are both exhausted when their time is up. They’re both aching in their own ways, but neither of them wants to admit it to the other. The sun hasn’t even gone down yet! As they shuffle into their respective outerwear, Mako looks back towards the play room and spots Moira once again, watching him with uncanny attention in her mismatched eyes. She licks her chops despite having not having ate anything, then follows it with a languidly slow blink before standing up and walking away. Mako feels like she’s trying to tell him something, and only now does he lament having not studied the language of cats and witchcraft. 

Jamie and Mako head out and pause before getting on the bike and look at each other, as if wordlessly recognising that they’re both exhausted, but the night is still young.

“...We still on for dinner and a movie?” Jamie asks. Now’s his time to bail if he’s not feeling so hot about their chemistry -- and he wouldn’t really blame the other if he threw in the towel; their conversation got a little heavier than it should have on a first date.

“Yeah,” Mako responds. Jamie lets out a silent, relieved breath. “Said it was my choice, right?”

Jamie nods.

“What are you in the mood for?”

He gives himself a moment, before suggesting: “Burgers?”

Mako strokes his chin in thought. He’s about to protest and say that he’s vegetarian, but before he’s able to give a voice to it, he remembers a place that he’s heard of, but was never in the neighbourhood for. Right now, they just happen to be a few minutes from it, and all he can do is hope that it lives up to the hype.

“I know the perfect place,” he says as he hands Jamie the helmet, who seems to be a lot less timid about holding on to Mako when he gets on the bike. Likewise, it doesn’t feel as nerve-wracking to have him holding on to Mako.

The place is only a six minute drive away from the shelter, designed to look like one of those old-school diners with neon and chrome curves. Jamie can’t help but laugh when they approach, thoroughly amused by the decor.

The place has an interesting schtick: they don’t have a menu as much as a list of things with which to make a custom-order burger. Jamie is delighted at all the different choices, while Mako is relieved to see that there are, true to the recommendations he’d been given, vegetarian options. 

It comes as no surprise to Jamie when he orders the veggie burger. He tends to notice patterns, and there’s no exception when he’s at work.

There’s a lull, after they finish making their orders, where they sit in a relatively comfortable, fatigue-driven silence. While Mako stares out the window with his hands folded on top of his stomach, Jamie has his chin in his palm, watching the other patrons chatter amongst themselves. A thought occurs to him…

“How long ya been pescatarian?”

Mako turns his attention to Jamie, giving a half-hearted shrug. “Since I was a kid, more or less.”

“Huh! Long time to commit to a diet like that. How’d ya do it?”

Mako’s expression turns wry. “It’s a habit that just stuck. It’s a… long story."

“We got time,” Jamie offers, noting the crowd with a nod of the head.

He’s got a point. Mako sighs. “I’ve always been big, and my mother very much cared for my… well-being. I think she would’ve left well enough alone if the paediatrician hadn’t put the fear of God in her about my weight. By doctor’s orders, they cut out all sweets and sodas, and when that didn’t work, they cut out carbohydrates… and then meats… until all I was eating by the age of ten was salads and protein shakes. Suffice it to say, one day I passed out from malnutrition with only having lost ten pounds to show for it.

“Once I got out of the hospital, Mum took me to the grocery store and told me to pick out whatever I wanted. I took back up everything but meat, because by then I decided that animals are too cute to eat. Never did see that paediatrician again, either; I bet she gave him a real ear bashing. In the end, she said that if she really had to choose which to see me suffer with, it wasn’t going to be starvation.”

“Some people are just big,” Jamie dismisses. “You don’t seem to--” he brings up his free hand for air quotes “--’suffer’ right now.”

“Mmh. I have breathing problems. And my joints are constantly...” Mako tilts his head to the side, causing an audible series of pop-cracks to count off. Jamie winces empathically.

“Heart problems? Blood pressure? Diabetes?”

“Nope. Nothing like that.”

Jamie scoffs, then sits back in his booth seat. “Seems like yer doin’ alright, then. Not like bein’ skinny means bein’ free of problems.”

“Oh, really?” Mako asks, smirking. What health problems could a demon possibly suffer from?  “Do tell.”

“Wot, ya mean besides the glaringly obvious ones?” Jamie waves his prosthetic hand, then points his index finger to his temple. “Most of it’s in here.”

“Oh.”

Well, that got heavier than expected.

“I didn’t mean--”

“Nah, it’s okay.” Jamie drops his hand. “Ain’t gonna stigmatise it like everyone else. I have anxiety and mania.”

Interesting. Those aren’t the traits usually associated with  _ Lilin;  _ they’re usually calm and collected. “How do you keep on top of it?”

“Oh, I used ta be on a ton of medication in high school. Worked for a while, ‘til I got tired of feelin’ catatonic all the time. Weaned myself off ‘em and now it’s mostly meditation, keeping on top of my diet, setting alarms, exercises, distractions… self-care routines.” Jamie holds up a hand and pinches his forefinger and thumb together, giving Mako a wink. “The occasional joint helps tremendously. With that  _ and _ the phantom pains.”

Mako nods. He’ll just take him at his word; he’s seen with his own eyes more evidence supporting this than not. “Is that why you wear  _ Manipura  _ jewellry?”

Jamie’s hand instinctively covers his chest, as if Mako knew it had been there all along and is just now calling it out. He’d actually noticed the familiar amber-coloured beads when Jamie was in just his tank top.

“Yeah. It’s a gift from some… friends. I went to Tibet to chill out with some monks when I was having a really difficult winter. That was actually the first step I was taking towards cutting out the medication from my life.”

“Sounds like an expensive trip.”

“Not when you’re living off the land. When in Rome--”

The conversation is interrupted when their burgers are brought to the table. As much as they’d like to continue their line of conversation, it gets quickly forgotten in their appetites, and no one thinks to bring it up again even after Mako finishes off the fries that Jamie doesn’t have room for. They allow themselves enough time to lounge around for a few minutes, killing time before the showing that Jamie purchased tickets for.

All in all, it was a rather wise choice, even though neither of them had the foresight to predict it. Apparently they hadn’t quite finished talking about heavy topics while at the shelter and came back for seconds at dinner, and while neither of them were particularly put-off by it, calling it a day without having ended it on a lighter note may have left a sour taste in their mouth when it wasn’t warranted.

Jamie, in particular, is feeling over the moon about it. He’d managed to go a whole date without laying it on thick, just  _ one _ inappropriate joke! That’s something he’d never been able to do before, and he’s quite proud of having done so. With a small, proud smile on his face, he tells himself that this is proof he  _ is _ capable of having a dating endgame that doesn’t become less of a date and more of a courting session that ends in sex,  _ and _ he’s probably made a better impression for it!

As they get to the bike, Jamie automatically picks up the helmet and just before he slips it on, he hears a “Hey” behind him.  He turns to look up at Mako, who is giving him a warm smile, but what he says makes Jamie’s heart plummet:

“Do you want to stay the night with me?”


	4. IV

Jamie’s face falls.

Mako is quick to pick up on the energy. “You don’t have to--I’m just letting you know the offer is on the table.”

“I mean…” Jamie presses the helmet into his own chest, looking down into the shiny black vinyl, worn around the edges with age and getting knocked about. The sun has set just enough to turn on the street lights, and it makes a bright, three-dot reflection on the helmet. “That’s not usually how first dates go, right? Spending the night together.”

Mako offers an innocent shrug. “I don’t have work tomorrow, and you don’t have school. I don’t see a reason to follow the status quo when I’ve got beer to share and cartoons on the DVR.”

With a small smile, Jamie looks up from the helmet. Just beer and cartoons, right? Right. “Ain’t got anythin’ packed, mate. Ya got spare toiletries floating around?”

“I’m sure I do.” Mako shrugs. “If I don’t, there’s a 24-hour servo a walk away my condo.”

“Alright.” Jamie’s smile grows and he plunks the helmet over his head, strapping himself in. “Count me in.”

Mako returns a grin of his own and mounts the bike. Jamie hops on after, comfortably leaning up against Mako’s expansive back. He watches the lively dusk streets of Melbourne pass with an upturned corner to his mouth; how could he possibly go home to a practically empty dorm building after a day like this? It’d fill him with nervous, unnecessary energy that would end up needing _some_ kind of outlet.

Jamie is pleasantly surprised when Mako ends up bringing him to one of the _really_ nice parts of town. The buildings, even the parking garage that Mako turns into, were built and maintained with the utmost attention to detail. Most people on the streets are wearing at _least_ business casual, and the long rows of apartment buildings and condos have their own little canvas-dome entrances emblazoned with fancy letters, waited on by nicely dressed valets.

Mako’s parking garage is climate-controlled and well-lit with assigned parking. When Jamie gets off the bike, he hands the helmet to Mako, who secures it to his machine.

“Hell of a part of town ya live in,” he comments. “Havin’ a hard time imaginin’ that no one’s tried ta make ya their sugar daddy.”

“Oh, plenty have _tried,_ ” Mako replies, amusement in his voice as they get into the elevator side-by-side. “None have succeeded.”

“Not interested in that kinda thing?”

Mako snorts. “Maybe if I wanted some kind of passing arrangement, sure. But there’s a fundamental difference between gold diggers and me: I like delayed gratification, and they abhor it.”

Jamie files that ‘delayed gratification’ comment silently in the back of his mind, then chastises himself for succumbing to old habits. The elevator opens back up, and they step out and onto the sidewalk. “Sounds about right, but how d’ya figure?”

“They don’t like it when you play hard-to-get. They figure that a big, pout-faced bloke is starved for attention.” Mako pushes the button to change the light for the crossing. “But once you try to make it challenging for them, they throw in the towel in a matter of minutes. I’ll never forget this one--spent forever trying to feel me up in the middle of the bar--he ended up storming off, imagine with the thickest lisp ever: ‘You’re just an old, creepy man anyway’.”

Jamie giggles as they cross the street. “Sounds ta me like he was hoping you _were_ one _,_ ” and Mako joins in with a chuckle of his own. “I hope I don’t come off like that.”

Money is the last thing Mako is worried about him stealing.

“You’re fine, Jamie. You asked me out _before_ you knew all of this.”

There’s a moment of awkward silence. Jamie isn’t sure how to respond.

“What, are you planning to change your tactics now that you do?”

“No, it’s more…”

Jamie cranes his neck upwards to look up at the tall condo building they’re about to enter. Mako and the valet exchange short nods of greeting as they pass.

“This kind of… lavish lifestyle… has always felt kind of… fictional?” he guesses, trying to find the words for it as his head comes back down once the canopy blocks his view. “I don’t want it ta seem like I want ya ta buy somethin’ for me just because it catches my eye.”

“Then I’ll just assume that you don’t want me to buy something unless you explicitly ask for it.” Mako shrugs; it’s a better arrangement than having to go off assumptions with passive-aggressive statements, and Mako would prefer the former by leaps and bounds.

“I still feel like being in your proximity is spoiling me!” They push past the doors and Jamie feels like his entire point is being made right before his eyes. “I mean, look at this place!”

He points upward, towards a gold and crystal chandelier. “That thing looks like it’s made of diamonds,” he points down towards a cylindrical fireplace that stands as the centrepiece of a seating area, “a fake fire pit when we live in freakin’ Oz,” and then to the giant aquarium implanted in the wall that serves as a backdrop to reception, “and a saltwater fish tank to boot.”

Mako can’t help but smirk as he leads Jamie to the elevators. “Please, Jamie. I only rent a condominium here. You’re acting like I own a yacht.”

Jamie arches a brow. “Well, _do_ you?”

Mako torturously lets the question hang in the air as they wait for the elevator to come down, unable to resist keeping that smirk on his face as Jamie stares up at him the entire time. The “invisible” tail behind him swishes with equal parts frustration and genuine curiosity. They step into the elevator when it opens, and then as it closes and starts to head up, Mako lazily scratches at his belly.

“I’ve considered it.”

He actually hasn’t, but that isn’t going to stop him from delighting in the exasperated eye roll and sigh coming from Jamie. He snorts with amusement, and the two of them stare at the number on the floor display steadily climbing.

“Why didn’tcha?”

“Hm?”

“Buy a yacht.”

“Oh.” Well, great, now he has to come up with an excuse. He mulls it over for a unsuspicious moment before answering: “I guess I didn’t love the idea enough to actually spend that kind of money. A boat like that takes a lot of work when you’re solo, and being _that_ alone and far from civilisation doesn’t sound that appealing.”

Jamie makes a thoughtful noise. “I suppose just because ya can afford somethin’ doesn’t mean ya should buy it.”

“That’s the trick to saving money. When I started out, I did nothing but pay for the cost of living. Working was my recreation.”

They get off at the 12th floor and head down the narrow hall--so narrow that Jamie has to follow Mako instead of walking by his side. “Normally I’d say that sounds depressing, but yer job was awesome.”

“Exactly.” Mako pulls out his keys from inside his jacket. Instead of a literal key, there’s a digital fob on his ring that he presses against a panel above the handle. There’s a clunk from within, and Mako opens the door, gesturing for Jamie to go in first.

He steps in and takes one good look around. He’s currently sandwiched between a kitchenette on his left and what he presumes is a bathroom on his right.  Down the walkway, all he can make out is a television, a coffee table, and the beginnings of a leather couch. Beyond that is a full, floor-to-ceiling, wall-to-wall window. He wasn’t expecting Mako to live in a place like this.

“Awfully small place for a big bloke,” he tempts, making his way farther in. “Not much bigger than my dorm…”

“I owned a bigger place when I lived in America. I had friends over all the time, and when I moved to the bush down here I couldn’t stand how empty the place felt. Mind, that’s what I thought I wanted at the time. So I downsized, even if it meant parting with a garage.”

Mako closes the door behind him and shucks his boots off, kicking them into their place at the base of his coat rack. His jacket, likewise, is hung up on it. Jamie looks over his shoulder before he goes too far into the condo, picking up on the situation. He balances on his peg leg and supports himself against the wall to kick up his foot behind him and pull his sneaker off. To Mako’s bewilderment, he does the same thing to his prosthetic, unscrewing the tip of his peg leg as if it were a soda bottle.

When he puts his leg back down, with the tip in hand, he finds Mako with his eyebrow arched in silent question.

“Oh.” Jamie laughs, holding up the tip. “Gotta keep the hips balanced, mate. Even an inch makes a huge difference.” He bends over to tuck the tip into his sneaker for safe keeping, then turns around and lifts his leg again so that he can show off what’s at the end of it now; besides the screw threading, it reminds Mako of the end of a billiards stick. “And it’s got a soft rubber tip so that I don’t fuck up someone’s hardwood floors or slip on tile. Not that I’ve got much ta worry about here with this carpet.”

“Clever,” Mako comments. Jamie puts his leg back down and bends down to reach his arms behind his back and pull off his hoodie. “I have to ask, though: why did you articulate a whole hand but not a foot?”

“I did,” he responds, edging by Mako to hang up his hoodie. “And don’t get me wrong, I got it working just fine, both on paper and in application--I’ve still got it hanging around--but I just couldn’t get it ta feel like anythin’ other than dead weight, especially when shoes get thrown into the equation. In the end, this feels way more natural than a fake foot.”

“That makes sense.” It goes without saying that Mako has never experienced a loss like that, but he can at least empathise with the sentiment. Jamie steps away to explore the place, and Mako follows. He can’t give much of a tour of a place you can see by standing in one spot and turning 360 degrees.

The wall to Jamie’s left has a mounted flat screen television, and under it is a glass entertainment cabinet with all sorts of tech. Then there’s the glass coffee table in front of it, which has a vase of colourful, fake flowers next to a short stack of thick paperback books that have been well-loved. A soapstone incense burner, with a cute, chubby porcelain pig holder has some fresh ashes on it; that explains the faint, recognisable scent that Mako’s condo has, but Jamie’s not familiar enough with it to put a name to it.

The couch is in good condition with its unmarred black leather, barring the exception of the crater in the middle that absolutely has Mako’s name written all over it. There’s a bunch of throw pillows, all with cheeky and cute and lacy patterns. One in particular catches his attention: it’s the shape of a pleasantly plump kiwi, curled up on itself and snoozing. A blanket depicting a layout with Aggretsuko, the mild-mannered, metal-loving red panda and her coworkers is draped over the back of the couch.

Behind the couch is the bed, taking up the majority of the space since it’s a king size. It’s been hastily made, the maroon and black comforter embroidered with a pattern Jamie doesn’t recognise. If there’s a headboard to it, he can’t see it through the mountain of plush animals; most of them are pigs and Pachimari, but there’s a pretty generous variety to them otherwise. There’s a nightstand next to the bed with a machine that he doesn’t recognise. There’s a mirror on the opposite side of the bed, depicting a reflection of the city outside and making the space feel much bigger because of it. Nestled up against the wall between the bed and the closet is a small computer desk, but instead of a proper monitor there’s just a massive drawing tablet mounted on a fully adjustable pole.

Jamie is, honestly, already in love with the place by this point. But all hope is truly lost when he looks out of the window and he sees a view of Melbourne’s CBD at just the right height. Most buildings are below eye-level here, with the occasional skyscraping office building that reaches up beyond what Jamie can see. The overall viewing experience is incredibly _immersive,_ leaving a sense of being surrounded by the hustle and bustle of the city while wrapped in a quiet, peaceful little oasis suspended amongst it all.

“Like the view?” Mako asks, in the process of yanking off his shirt and throwing it into a hamper next to the mirror-doored closet. The affair nearly takes his glasses with it, but he’s quick to nudge them back into place.

“Yeah,” Jamie admits, looking over his shoulder. “I’m jealous that you get ta fall asleep looking out at the city.”

“Fancy that: now _you_ get to as well.”

The view of the city becomes significantly less impressive when Mako reaches up to let his hair down. All the way down. To his mid-back. Mako runs his fingers through it at his scalp, fluffing it out and some locks cascade over his shoulders to drape over his rounded pectorals and the upper swell of his belly, and between the strands Jamie can see the shine of some understated barbell piercings through his nipples. The tattoo sleeves on his arm make a smooth transition into blank skin with their tightly compacted details dissolving over his shoulder blades and chest.

Jamie swallows hard, then squeaks out, “I like yer hair.” He’s gonna have to scrounge up every drop of temperance inside of him to get through tonight, all because he didn’t have the willpower to decline the offer to come here.

“Thanks,” Mako responds. “I’ve been working on it for a while.”

“Does it, uh...grow in that colour?”

Mako runs his thick fingers through his hair, lifting up a few strands to look at them through his index and middle fingers. “No, I’m a few shades darker. Used to have raven black hair when I was younger.”

“I can see it. But I like the white, too.” His eyes trail downward, but when they don’t stop when his hair does, cartoon pig and all… Jamie mentally slaps himself out of it and turns away from the window. “Do ya mind if I take a shower?”

“Go ahead,” Mako says with a nod of his head in the direction of the bathroom. “Help yourself to whatever’s in there. I’ll have the beer ready for you when you get out.”

“Aces! Back in a tic.”

Mako watches as Jamie passes by him to get to the bathroom. When the door closes behind him, Mako lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding back. It’s been a long time since someone’s looked at him like that; some kind of true admiration, instead of awe, or fetish, or disgust. He feels like some kind of infatuated teenager, and it makes sense when he considers that it’s probably some kind of magic or aura Jamie puts off. Nothing is more of a turn-on than feeling like the other person genuinely finds you attractive, right? It’s all part of his plan. He takes off the rest of his clothing now that Jamie is out of the room, changing into just a pair of tropical-print loungewear shorts. He puts his hair in a loose braid, grabs a single beer for himself, and sits on the couch, taking up one of his books and resuming where he left off to the background noise of the shower.

“Shit,” Jamie utters when he realises that Mako only has a walk-in shower instead of a tub. At least the thing is squeaky clean, making the concept of sitting on the floor of a shower a little less depressing. He picks out a bodywash, shampoo, and conditioner from the racks up on the wall and puts them down on the floor. Thankfully, there’s an actual neck for the shower, so he pulls it down from its holder to hang freely. From a shelf of linens, he retrieves a single white, fluffy towel, and puts it by the floor next to the sliding door. After that, he pulls off his clothes and dumps them on the floor unceremoniously, then turns to look at himself in the mirror.

Shock-blonde hair, pale skin, and amber eyes back stare back at him. His mouth and angular, bushy brows are twisted into the very image of anxiety; he’s chewing on his bottom lip without even realising it. He forces himself to stop and holds up his flesh hand, middle finger and thumb pressed together.  With a forceful flick, he snaps and the disguise blows away like fluffy flakes off the tip of a snowdrift, leaving rose-red skin, blackened horns, ashy blonde hair, and eyes like candle flame staring back at him.

 _I’m more than what I was made,_ he tells himself. _I’m more than my hunger. I have control over my actions. I make my own choices. I make my own choices._

He takes in a big inhale, then lets it out, slowly, to the count of ten.

 **_I_ ** _make my_ **_own_ ** _choices._

Jamie checks the bathroom door to double-check and make sure that it’s locked. After turning on the water to get warm, he pulls down the toilet lid so he can sit on it and take off his prosthetics. He places them down beside the towel, then does the ungraceful, one-sided crawl into the shower.

Thanks to the shower hose, the process goes smoothly. He enjoys giving himself a little scrub with a scent he recognises as Mako’s, predominantly sandalwood and sage. Masculine without being gag-worthy. The shampoo really is something else, opaque purple and smelling rather fruity.  The conditioner leaves his hair feeling like silk. Mako must’ve spent years finding the right combination for that beautiful hair of his.

Jamie crawls out of the shower and back up to the toilet when he’s done. He grabs the towel and dries himself off, then throws it over his head and shuffles it through his hair, which has taken on a slightly more white-gold appearance thanks to the shampoo. Once the metal contacts embedded in his stumps are completely dry, he re-attaches his prosthetics and gives them a few testing flexes in the fingers, wrist, and knee.

He gets up to admire the change of colour to his hair, running his fingers through it and deciding that he should probably implement the same type of change within his glamour spell. He likes what it did to his real hair; it contrasts well with the warm black tone of his horns, but unfortunately it’s not something he can show off.

With his prosthetic hand gripping the sink, he reaches out and touches the mirror, placing his black-clawed finger on the reflection of his forehead. He opens his mouth and two voices speak quietly, one much like his own with a reverberation, and a female one with just as much of an echo:

“Im͟v̶̶͟a̶̷͠r̢m̸a̴͠r ̕͡c̷̡͜ao̢s͠go̸̶n̴͟.”

His image in the mirror distorts, like dropping food dye into water. Starting from his forehead, that human skin tone comes back, his horns disappear and are replaced with regular human hair, the flames in his eyes concentrate into the centre leaving white cornea in their wake. The glamour consumes him inch by inch.

Once it’s finished, Jamie leans in closer to the mirror and investigates his hair. He made it a consistent few shades lighter, a believable amount of change for such an odd shampoo.

He looks down at his clothes: a sweaty tank top and boxers, and uncomfortable jeans. He debates putting them back on, but…

Maybe Mako has something better that he can borrow. He unlocks the door and opens it a crack.

“Oi, Mako?” he calls out.

“Yeah?”

“Happen to have anythin’ I can wear overnight? Kinda sweat through my clothes earlier, don’t really wanna put them back on.”

Mako silently boggles. Of course he has stuff, but is any of it actually going to fit Jamie? He tucks his bookmark in the novel he’s reading and puts it down on the table. “Let me see what I have.”

Jamie closes the door and starts picking up his clothes, folding them up neatly and stacking them. Mako goes through his closet to find _anything_ Jamie might be able to use, even going through long-forgotten drawers in the bottom of the closet out of desperation, and in the bottom back corner he finds an Arch Enemy graphic tee that a friend got him as a gift. Despite being the largest size they had, it never actually fit him, but it was too thoughtful of a gift to give away. He’d always told himself that he’d make some kind of wall decoration out of it, but never got around to it.

He raps a knuckle against the bathroom door, and Jamie opens it slightly to take the offered shirt through the crack, closing it after the exchange. Mako takes a few steps to grab a second beer from the fridge and snaps open the bottle’s cap with his bare hand. After he tosses the cap into the bin, he opens a drawer and pulls out a stubby to fit the beer in so that it will stay cold longer. 

By the time he looks up, Jamie has exited the bathroom, dressed in nothing but a black oversized shirt. It fits him like a dress, exposing his angular collar bones and with a comfortable length ending just before his knees. Mako has to admit that there’s something really perfect and amusing about seeing an actual demon wearing a shirt with metal band branding. He notices that Jamie’s hair has lightened up to the point of being a yellowy white, but he doesn’t comment on it for obvious reasons.

“Bonzer shirt,” Jamie comments, picking at the screen printed graphic as he looks down at it, studying the intricate details of the design. “I haven’t listened to them in a while.”

“I have a few vinyls if you want to fix that,” Mako offers, holding out the stubby-fitted beer bottle to Jamie, who returns a cordial “cheers” before taking a swig.

“Maybe later. Already had somethin’ lined up for us, yeah?”

“Of course.” Mako nods his head towards the couch. “Make yourself comfortable; I’m gonna grab another beer.”

Jamie turns and heads towards it. He picks the spot that would have him on Mako’s left side, assuming he’ll take a seat in his nicely sculpted crater. He folds up his legs and tucks the end of the shirt between his thighs to keep himself decent. Mako switches out his own stubby for a new beer and heads back to the couch, wondering silently why Jamie’s legs looks longer and curvier folded up like that.

Sure enough, Mako sits in his usual spot. He drops himself into place, and the cushions send Jamie upwards for a quick second before his weight settles back into it, causing Jamie to giggle. Once he’s in place, he leans forward to grab the remote and leans back, his remote-hand elbow resting on a pile of pillows while his beer arm is slung over the back of the couch behind Jamie.

Jamie nurses his beer while Mako flips through DVR menus to get to his recordings. He figures Mako must’ve been waiting a long time to have the opportunity to watch this with someone, because there’s quite a backlog of episodes. The truth is… Mako wasn’t _specifically_ waiting for someone to watch it with--he’d either been spending his time reading or working on his designs, but this seems like the perfect time to catch up since it’s something they can do together.

About halfway through the first episode, Mako looks down and finds Jamie’s head resting on the top of the swell of his belly, out of the way just enough as to not block any of Mako’s view of the television. From Mako’s perspective, it’s a bizarre sight to see, because Jamie’s right horn appears to simply disappear into Mako’s skin, like polygons clipping in a video game. He’d never noticed the long, narrow and tapered ear sticking out from the centre of the coil of his horns, subtly moving back and forth and up and down in time with his facial expressions reacting to what is happening in the show. It’s lined with piercings on the bottom and the very tips; subtle, small things, like they’re only there as retainers.

Mako tunes out the cartoon to concentrate on focusing on Jamie’s actual appearance. The red skin and horns fade away, leaving platinum blonde and pale skin. His human body has one stud in his lobe, then three in a row up in the shell of his ear. Mako lets go of the remote and runs his fingers through Jamie’s still-damp hair.

“Looks like my shampoo did a number on you.”

“Hm?” Jamie moves his head, as if trying to put in effort to look at Mako, but he’s too comfortable to commit to it. “Did it? It’s not white now, is it?” he feigns innocence casually.

“No,” Mako answers. “Just a lighter blonde.”

“Oh, that’s fine. I like white on you, dunno about myself.”

Mako snorts in amusement. His real appearance is only a shade away from white now. Still, he has to admire that kind of attention to detail. He lets go of Jamie’s hair and switches the beer bottle between his hands so that he can rest one over Jamie’s hip. The other shifts a little bit, and Mako starts pulling his hand away, concerned that maybe it was making him uncomfortable--but he only gets about an inch away before Jamie rests his hand on top of Mako’s, shuffling a little bit more, and once he gets comfy he pushes Mako’s hand back down on his hip.

Mako smiles to himself. _This is nice._ This is how he wants to feel on his last day on this planet. He allows himself to relax and Jamie’s disguise fades back out of his view. Out of his peripheral, he catches Jamie’s currently incorporeal tail curled lazily around his wrist.

 _Damn this demon,_ he thinks. _Doing all this adorable shit when he thinks I can’t see it. Must love playing with his food, huh? I can’t stand it._

Mako’s fingers creep forward, pressing in and feeling Jamie’s taut lower abs. He can feel a thick Adonis belt under his thumb.

_He makes it seem so effortless… no wonder he doesn’t have any problem luring people in._

In return of the affection, Jamie rubs his warm hand over Mako’s exposed stomach and, coincidentally, that ridiculous tattoo, the corners of his mouth turn up into a content smile. Mako lets out a deep, relaxed sigh. Neither of them are paying even remotely as much attention to the show as they’re pretending. It’s nice to just be petted, and not any of that _heavy petting_ nonsense. Jamie doesn’t get much platonic physical affection like this, and he has to admit that it _does_ feed him a little bit.

When credits for the current episode start rolling, Jamie breaks their entanglement to stand up on his knees, stabilising himself with one hand on the top of Mako’s belly, and giving himself a slight height advantage over Mako for once. He’s grinning gleefully, and Mako turns to him with a muted smile of his own. Jamie leans down and gives Mako a chaste kiss on the cheek.

 _I_ ** _really_** _can’t stand it._

Mako leans in and starts planting kisses on Jamie’s exposed collarbones, eliciting a small yelp from him.

_This must be what he meant when he was going on about steak before… but he’s not offering me that rare steak right now, is he? No, this one is cooked just the way I like..._

Jamie tilts his head down, Mako tilts his head up, and they lock lips. They both taste like beer and burgers.

_Steak good enough to make me want to break my diet._

They’re both experts at their craft, despite this being the first time they’ve kissed. Soft, damp, smacking noises fill the air as a discordant percussion to the otherwise upbeat pop song that accompanies the show’s outro. No beat goes missed as they suck on each other’s lips and tongues, like a practiced choreography that just _screams_ compatibility, like this was all meant to be from the get-go.

_Go on, then… show me the monster you really are._

Mako shifts his hand down from Jamie’s hip and slips his fingers under the hem of the oversized shirt, allowing his blunt fingernails to trail across sensitive, bright red skin, taking his sweet time and inching ever closer to--

“Mako!”

The room fills with an eerie silence. Mako’s wrist is held firm by a metal grip with tightness that sends a mild sensation of fear down his spine; with his extremely high pain tolerance he can’t say that it hurts, but he knows if he dares try to move his fingers, the metal thumb buried between his tendons assures him that it would be a bad idea, assuming he manages to move them at all.

They both sit stock-still for seconds that feel like full minutes. Mako has no idea what’s going on, but he doesn’t like the slight tremble in Jamie’s body. It’s not a good tremble. A storm starts brewing in his gut, telling him that _he_ caused Jamie’s discomfort. Even with that in mind, he doesn’t have the ability to retract his hand and back away from the situation.

“I…” Jamie’s voice is the only thing to break the silence. He lets go of Mako’s hand, and he slowly, cautiously draws it away from Jamie. The other brings his own hands up, cupping Mako’s thick cheeks, sandwiching his face between one cold hand and one warm one and forcing his head up to look at him. Mako stares intently into Jamie’s fire-laden eyes, and Jamie desperately tries to do the same but all he can look at are those dark black lenses. He searches in the darkness for anything to anchor to, his eyes flitting across the flat surface, but never finding solid purchase. His long ears are pulled back and down out of fear.

“I’ll be totally honest, mate…” His smile is burdened by sadness. “I really would love nothing more than to fuck until neither of us can walk, but… I need to try to form a relationship that doesn’t use sex as its foundation.”

Mako stares in awed silence. A _Lilin._ Turning down sex. What’s _wrong_ with this guy?

Jamie looks downward, even though he has Mako’s head still clasped between his hands.

“The truth is… I know you invited me to spend the night with you, but… I really did think all we were gonna do was beer and telly.” Shyly, he looks back up at Mako. He doesn’t have the strength to keep the smile on his face.

 _Oh my God,_ Mako thinks, opening his mouth but no sound comes out. _That’s right. He didn’t want to come here at first._

Jamie tries his hardest to smile even in the thick silence that Mako is giving him, but he doesn’t feel like it’s coming through very well, especially when his voice cracks in the middle of his words:

“I hope… you’re not disappointed.”

“No.”

He doesn’t know what to say, but he knows that he can at least assure Jamie that he’s not disappointed. In fact, it’s so much _not_ a disappointment that it’s a shock to his system. Here he was, ready to shuffle off this mortal coil in a long, ecstatic night, prove to himself that he’s seen all there is to see of this world and the demons that live in it, _and_ that everything is just as predictable as he believes it to be. He got himself stuck and obsessed with his own stupid pride that when all the signs pointed in one direction, he _specifically_ stood at an angle to make it look like they were pointing in another one just to prove he was right.

Because of that, he put Jamie, who has been nothing but kind, honest, and vulnerable, in a terrible, uncomfortable spot. He just wants a normal, human relationship, just like all the normal, human things he tries to do, like going to school, having a job, cuddling with cats, and changing his hair colour after using a toner shampoo. And here Mako is, dangling a carrot in front of him when he’s probably having to call upon all of his self-control to resist his natural temptations.

_I’m an asshole._

“I’m not disappointed,” he reasserts, but he’s lying. He’s disappointed in himself. “I’m sorry. I guess I got wound up with… everything. Today has been the most fun I’ve had in years.”

Now _that_ part is absolutely true. And it’s just what Jamie wants to hear too, because the flicker in his eyes comes back as a true, genuine smile finally breaks through.

“That’s okay. I know the feeling,” he reassures Mako, a subtle laugh in his words.

“We can still cuddle, right?” Mako asks.

Jamie laughs and plants a kiss on the broad tip of Mako’s nose, then finally lets go of his face. The relief is palpable even to Mako.  “Of _course_ we can still cuddle, ya drongo.”

Mako gives him a smile. “Then, in that case… now _I’m_ the one that needs a shower.” He turns to find the abandoned remote and hands it to Jamie, puts the beer that he’d been clinging to on the coffee table, and then stands up to go to the bathroom. Jamie still has a cheerful expression, ears up and perky, as Mako begins to move away.

“Don’t blow anything up while I’m gone.”

“No promises~ ♪”


	5. V

Mako enters the bathroom, still smirking to himself at Jamie’s cheeky retort. Even with the freely flowing jokes, he still feels a guilt in the pit of his stomach, and part of him wouldn’t be surprised if he finished his shower and found Jamie gone… even though he left his clothes in the bathroom. Oh well; the streets of Melbourne have seen stranger things than a guy in just an oversized shirt.

As he draws himself a cold shower, he catches sight of his bottles of wash in the corner of his eye and wonders why they’ve been been left on the floor (and the shower head left hanging by its hose) for a few seconds before he figures it out for himself. He picks them up and puts them back on their perches.

Mako spends less time scrubbing up than just standing under the torrent of water, reflecting on everything that’s happened up until this point. All of today’s date, that time at  _ Jiyu, _ the moment they met at the library. It was at some point during the  _ Jiyu  _ trip that Mako’s instincts were relaxed enough that he couldn’t even see Jamie’s disguise, that he had to actively concentrate to get it to be in focus. He really should have listened to his internal voice. He should have listened to Moira, who was showing him that Jamie could be trusted. He should have listened to  _ Jamie, _ who trusted himself enough to try to decline what had started to sound like an invitation to yet another one night stand.

He heaves out a sigh, his body rocking with the gesture, and he gives a little cough at the end. Maybe this world still  _ does _ have a few lessons to teach him. And maybe there’s another fun chapter of his life left after all…

Well, as long as Jamie will forgive him. Mako smiles to himself at the thought, though he doesn’t  realise it. 

With the essentials done and his blood back where it belongs, he steps out of the shower, dries off, and puts his shorts back on. When he steps out of the bathroom, he’s relieved to find that Jamie did indeed stick around, but all of his couch pillows have been scattered and re-arranged. Jamie--tall enough to be longer than the couch--has spread out along it, face-down as he flips through channels.

_ Damn  _ those legs. He may only have one fully intact, but what he has is near perfection. It goes on for miles, and with his mild muscle build and nearly nonexistent body fat, it has a pleasing and almost feminine curve to his calf. His full leg has two well-defined tendons that reach up into equally well-defined thigh muscles, likely from having to do the work of two. His other thigh, conversely, has very little tone to it at all, sporting a thin layer of fat, before it disappears into the cloth-like socket of Jamie’s prosthetic. His skin is smooth like marble, not a single hair to be found, even lacking significant calluses on his heel. In that bright red skin, he can see simple, subtle dark lines that curve along the contours of his muscle; if they have any use, Mako doesn’t know, but they make his legs that more appealing to look at.

He wants to reach out and touch both of them  _ so _ bad, but he’ll behave himself for now.

“Hey!”  he barks, feigning anger. It’s all in his voice, though; there’s a teasing smile on his face. “You messed up my nest.”

Jamie giggles and picks up a pillow from the floor to give it a throw at Mako’s face. His aim is spot-on, yet Mako simply stops it in mid-air with his hand.

“ _ Woah, _ ” Jamie comments. “Nice catch!”

Mako says nothing. He just approaches the couch and presses the pillow down on Jamie’s head, sandwiching him between both the pillows he’s resting on. Jamie squawks a laugh and flails. “I can’t breathe!”

“If you can talk,” Mako says darkly, adding more pressure downward, “then you can still  _ breathe _ .”

“No!” Jamie laughs, trying to pull his head out of its pillowy trap with a few tugs before going slack. “Oh, shit,” he murmurs, “I can’t get out…”

Mako lets off, tossing the pillow onto the small of Jamie’s back. “Let that be a lesson to you: don’t mess with my stuff.”

He turns to look at the coffee table and investigates the two abandoned beers. His own is empty, and Jamie’s has a few swallows still in it. He hands it to Jamie, who’s already in the process of sitting up. He takes the beer, finishes off with a swig, then hands the empty bottle back to Mako.

“I think we’ll have to re-watch the last episode,” Mako says, disposing of the bottles and re-dressing the stubbies around fresh ones. He pops off their caps before bringing them back to the couch.  “I wasn’t paying attention at all.”

“Oh yeah, nah, me neither.” Jamie takes his beer and scoots to the side so that Mako can have his proper seat back. He does, but it’s just not the same now that his pillows are all messed up. Taking proper responsibility for what he’s done, Jamie helps collect the scattered pillows and tries to arrange them around Mako to the best of his memory; together they manage to make something not  _ quite _ the same, but just as workable. Instead of resting his head on Mako’s belly, he now sits up a little straighter and settles up against his shoulder.  Mako’s hand rests just on the outside of Jamie’s hip and thigh.

This time, Jamie takes control of the remote, having figured it out while Mako was in the shower, and freely takes on the responsibility of queueing up the episodes and fast forwarding through the adverts.

The rest of the episodes go by without much incident except for some flared emotions at a dramatic betrayal. Their positions keep shifting as the hours pass; by midnight, Mako halfway on his side and halfway leaning against the back of the couch. Jamie’s sprawled on top of him, noodly limbs just about everywhere except for his arm tucked up against Mako’s chest and his hand under his own head. Neither of them have fallen asleep, but their energy is definitely starting to wane in time with the growing pile of beer bottles in the recycle bin. 

Mako reaches a hand up and he sinks the tips of this thick fingers into the fluffy hair on the nape of Jamie’s neck. In response, Jamie murmurs pleasantly and turns his head just slightly, down into the thick pad of Mako’s double chin to expose more access to his neck.

“You want to go to bed?” Mako asks quietly.

“Mm…” He really wants to stay up, but he’s so sleepy (and buzzed) that it doesn’t sound like a bad idea. “Yeah, sure,” he says, moving off of Mako to allow him the space to get up.

“I’ll see if I can find a toothbrush for you,” he says, getting to his feet. “You’re welcome to use my toothpaste.”

“Aces,” Jamie mumbles, rubbing at his eye, and Mako takes a second to admire how adorable the sleepy little demon is before going to the bathroom.

… not that he’s actually very  _ little _ , but perception is a matter of perspective.

Mako goes digging through his bathroom to find a spare manual toothbrush, floss, and to his surprise, some razors and travel-sized cream. Not that he’s ever seen Jamie with even the slightest suggestion of stubble, but he’d might as well humour him and pretend like he’s expecting it to be needed. He lays out his finds on Jamie’s folded-up clothes and begins brushing his teeth. When he turns off the buzzing brush and spits into the sink, he hears the ever-familiar sound of corrugated tubing rubbing up against the edge of his nightstand.

_ Shit.  _ He really should have… covered it over or… something. It’s not exactly a very sexy thing to find in someone’s bedroom, and not only has Jamie noticed it but now he’s playing with it, probably trying to figure out how it works. A sour embarrassment settles into Mako’s chest and he leaves the bathroom to find Jamie sitting on the edge of his bed and investigating his CPAP machine.

“Oh, hey,” he says, turning to Mako and holding up the tube-connected mask. “This some kind of personal humidifier or something?”

“It’s called a CPAP machine,” Mako answers evenly, trying not to show the amount of self-consciousness he feels right now. “Stands for  _ continuous positive airway pressure; _ it’s for sleep apnea.”

“Ah! I remember ya talkin’ about breathing stuff earlier.” Jamie gently puts the mask down on the bed. “Thought I could figure it out on my own. Usually can figure out a machine by taking it apart.”

Mako sighs. The concept of Jamie dismantling medically necessary devices is more uncomfortable than Jamie finding it in the first place. “Don’t take my CPAP apart.”

Jamie smiles sheepishly. “Well, I don’t need to now! And… I actually thought it was broken. Didn’t do anything when I turned it on.”

“Needs a few minutes to start up.” Mako moves over to the bed and sits beside Jamie. “Go wash up, I found everything you’d need.”

“Ta,” Jamie says, placing the mask on the bed. He hops off the bed and heads to the bathroom, and once he’s out of sight, Mako takes off his sunglasses to put on the nightstand. He picks up a small, rectangular remote that is dwarfed in his hand before rotating a dial with his thumb to dim the apartment lights to darkness.

The ambient light from the city casts a paltry amount of illumination into the apartment--only enough to see the shape of objects but not their colour. The night sky is black, void-like and starless, punctured only by the dozen lights in the city still left on. He turns to look at himself and like a black hole; Mako’s dark, rounded silhouette is reflected against the mirrors of his closet doors, blocking out the already meagre light managing to filter in. In the void of light, there is an eerie presence of a single moonlight-white Min Min light, as if it had crawled out of the ravenous expanse of the Outback just to watch him from the depths of his own shadow.

But it’s no spirit or demon stalking him from a distance; it’s the iris of his own otherwise black eye, simply watching his own reflection.

Mako lets out a sigh and reaches down to pick up his CPAP mask, fastens it to his face and turns it on (meanwhile undoing all the setting changes that Jamie didn’t realise he was making). By the time Jamie comes back out of the bathroom, Mako is slipping an eye mask over himself--the sides are made out to be two round cartoon pigs nuzzling each other in the middle. Despite being practically blinded, he navigates his own bed enough to pull the covers down without getting tangled in the machine’s tube. He practically rolls himself onto the bed, and after he settles on his side and faces the window--not that it makes much of a difference--Jamie wastes no time in crawling under the covers and immediately sidling up with him.

“You’re gonna miss the view,” Jamie says, reaching for the elastic of the mask. Mako can’t say anything with the CPAP attached to his face, but he swats at Jamie’s hand with intentional half heartedness to minimise the chance of flaring up his curiosity. “Alright, alright--suit yourself.” He plants a kiss to Mako’s temple, then lays on his side as well, choosing to use Mako’s outstretched arm as his pillow and conforming his back against Mako’s belly, with Mako’s other arm draped over Jamie’s hip. “G’night, Mako.”

The next few minutes are of peaceful, relative silence, with the exception of the soothing, breath-pattern white noise of Mako’s CPAP. Jamie is more than happy to take in the view like he wanted, but as time passes he realises that, in spite of his sleepiness, he can’t seem to get comfortable enough to drift off. He sticks through it stubbornly for a little while longer, even though he knows that the solution to this is as inevitable as it is nagging.

With a frustrated little huff, Jamie sits up and starts taking off his prosthetics. The shift in weight in the mattress jostles Mako off of the precipice of sleep and wakefulness, but he dares not move or otherwise indicate that he’s been disturbed from falling asleep. He can figure out what Jamie is doing just from the sound, and he decides to leave him be; he doesn’t need to add potential guilt to what may be a self-conscious moment.

Jamie leaves his prostheses on the floor, lined up with the edge of the bed, and he lets out a small grumble at the frustration of having to get up out of his comfortable position for it all. Even though Jamie’s pressed up against Mako’s belly again, there’s palpable tenseness in the air.

In order to help cut through it, Mako reaches up into the pile of plush toys at their heads and pulls out a single Pachimari. He slowly brings it up to his estimation for where Jamie’s head is, and once he feels the other turn his head to look at it, Mako gives it a rapid squeeze to make it squeak cheerfully at him.

Jamie giggles as he feels his frustration melt away. He takes Mako by surprise when he wraps an arm and a half around Mako’s forearm, pulling it up against his chest to cuddle his hand and the Pachimari still in it. He finds it awfully endearing… so he returns the gesture, pulling Jamie into his chest with the arm he has captive. Finally comfortable, Jamie quickly finds sleep.

But when a  _ Lilin _ sleeps, rarely is it ever  _ just _ sleep. Once Mako starts dreaming, it’s a prime opportunity to use his magic in a way that is mutually beneficial without crossing any borders that he feels he needs permission to pass.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Technically, Jamie is the first to wake up. He’s even more conformed to Mako’s front than he was when he fell asleep, leg bent to mould to the curve of his belly, which puts his heel in a rather precarious position. Good thing he’s not really a sleep-kicker.

His grip on Mako’s arm has loosened to a casual hold, just like Mako’s grip on him. Pachimari is still trapped between Mako’s palm and Jamie’s chin. Melbourne’s sky is bright and blue with only a handful of wispy clouds to be accounted for. It’s a beautiful morning, and… he doesn’t really have a reason to get up. In fact, there’s far more reasons to stay in bed.

So he does, and falls back asleep.

The second time he wakes up, it’s to an empty bed and the smell of breakfast cooking.

Jamie sits up, drawing up the sheets with his knee. Pachimari falls into his lap and he looks down at it in passing surprise, then back up as he tries to get a view of the kitchenette. Due to the corner, he can only catch a glimpse of Mako’s arm in passing. He yawns and rubs at his eye.

“It’s funny,” he says at the end of his yawn. “Usually I’m the one making breakfast…”

“Good morning,” Mako replies from afar.

“Mornin’,” Jamie responds, though his voice is strained as he folds himself over in a stretch. His head lands somewhere below his knees as he reaches all the way to get a solid handful of his own matte black painted toes. After holding it for a moment, he sits back up and leans against the pile of plushies as if they were the back to a recliner. “How’d you sleep?”

“Really well, actually…” A smile is audible in his voice. “The company is nice.”

Jamie smirks. Another night’s work done well, and Mako is none the wiser.

“Yeah, me too.”

Mako’s head peeks past the corner between them. He already has his sunglasses on--but then again, with the amount of sunlight that shines through these windows, Jamie is hardly surprised. Mako takes a second to admire the scene as Jamie gives him a smile, then turns to look out the windows. His bright red skin is bleached by the sun, and his dark horns stand out against his almost-white hair just like he stands out against a backdrop of plushies. The angle of the sun is just right to cast shadows emphasising the razor-straight contour of Jamie’s neck muscles and the curves of his shoulders.

“Have any food allergies?” Mako asks. 

“Nah, we’re good.”

“In that case, breakfast is ready.” He starts piling the different things he’s made on a tray to carry it all at the same time. “Weather’s nice; want to eat on the balcony?”

“Sounds like a dream!”

“Slide the door open for me, then?”

“Oh, one sec.” Jamie shifts himself to the edge of the bed to lean over and grab his discarded leg. In a few quick seconds he has it attached and responsive, and he bounces on over to pull the glass door open for Mako just in time for him to make his way over.  Mako shimmies out and places the high-piled tray on the glass table between two black wicker-like chairs, but before joining him, Jamie heads back inside. He fetches his remaining limb and attaches it, spending the time to make sure that it’s fully responsive with a roll of his wrist and wiggling his fingers before finally joining Mako outside.

“What a feast,” Jamie comments as he takes a seat. “You usually make this much breakfast?”

Mako shrugs, already piling pancakes and raspberry preserves onto his plate and topping it off with whipped cream. “Only when I have company.”

Jamie takes the other spare plate and scoops scrambled eggs mixed with broccoli and cheese onto it, along with a dollop of greek yogurt and a generous portion of the fresh berry mix.

“But seriously, mate--cheers. This is the nicest surprise someone’s given me in a long time. Ya really are spoilin’ me.”

Oh, that’s right. Speaking of spoiling him… Mako reaches for the untouched bottle of champagne on the corner of the tray, right next to a bottle of orange juice. With his bare hands, he undoes the foil and pops the cork. He reaches over the table and fills two champagne flutes to a quarter, then follows it up with the orange juice. Jamie stares the whole time, awed by the whole thing.

Well, it is kind of impressive. His arms  _ are _ big enough to reach across the table without so much as leaning forward in his chair.

Jamie takes the finished drink and sits back in his own chair.

“Here I am… eatin’ like I’m stayin’ at a five-star hotel while I’m dressed in nothin’ but an oversized tee. Hooley Dooley _ , _ what did I do to deserve this?”

Mako finishes his current mouthful before responding: “No,  _ I’m _ the one being spoiled.”

Jamie nearly chokes on his mimosa. “Bullshit. I denied you sex last night.”

Mako snorts. “So?”

“I dunno, mate, most people have their nights ruined by being turned down.”

“Neither of us are ‘most people’.”

Jamie pauses. He’s never felt that being turned down ruined his night either… and his very  _ life _ depends on getting it.

“Alright, point taken. So, what, ya just got a fetish for havin’ half-naked twinks sittin’ on yer porch?”

Mako gives no comment as he resumes eating his own food. Jamie is satisfied as that being answer enough, so he does the same. It’s not until Mako is half-way through his pancake stack that he returns to the conversation, keeping his head bowed down at his food as he pushes a raspberry over onto its side.

“You’re the first person to sit in that chair since I bought it.”

Jamie’s chewing comes to a full stop. He stares blankly at Mako for a second, then swallows.

“I picked out this place,” Mako continues, “because I liked the view. And I bought two chairs because I’ve always wanted to share it with someone.”

“Ah.” Jamie takes a sip of his drink. “I figured it’s because ya got ‘em on discount as a pair.”

Mako huffs a laugh out. “That too. Still would’ve been cheaper to buy just one.”

“Havin’ a hard time believin’  _ I’m _ the first one ta sit in this chair. Ain’t fer lack of tryin’ ta fill it?”

There’s a short pause as Mako turns his head towards the glass door, brows furrowed. “No one’s ever gotten past the bed.”

Jamie turns his head as well, frowning. He can’t really see the bed that well with the sunny reflection of the city against the glass, but still, he’s looking at it in spirit. He gets it without needing it to be explained--no one’s ever been able to get past it, literally  _ and _ figuratively. “They’re the ones missin’ out.”

“That’s what I’ve always said,” Mako says, his tone lightening. “But I can only say it so many times before I start thinking it might be time to put the toys away.”

“What a fuckin’  _ load! _ ”

The anger in Jamie’s voice startles Mako. He looks up at him urgently and makes no further comment; it’s unsettling to see him  _ genuinely  _ angry for the first time -- and not just the generalised frustration from his rant when they first met.

“Look. I know that we’re gettin’ along like a house on fire and it all started ‘cause we got the same taste in cartoons and Japanese mascots. That’s a given.” He waves his hands, all while his prosthetic one keeps a careful, delicate hold of his champagne flute. “But someone else doesn’t  _ need _ to embrace it ta make a relationship work. They gotta at  _ least _ tolerate it. And the longer it takes them to realise you’ve got taste in somethin’ they find--I don’t know, immature or whatever--the more they’re gonna expect ya to change that part of you ta suit their taste. So yeah, go ahead, put the stuffed toys away, but what’re ya gonna do when they find all those hours of animation saved on your DVR? When ya see a limited edition plush at the Sanrio store? Ya just gonna pass it all by just ‘cause ya elevated someone ta some kind of importance when they really didn’t care about what makes ya happy?”

A beat passes, and Mako’s grip goes slack on his fork, sending a small porcelain clink to slice through the silence. He opens his mouth to say something, but he really doesn’t know  _ what _ to say to all of that, other than the fact that he agrees, wholly and completely. He just never could figure out how to say it.

The silence only breaks when Jamie’s posture relaxes; he sighs and rubs a hand over his face.

“I need ta meditate…”

“No, it’s--... I agree.”

Jamie drops his hand and rubs at his knee. “That doesn’t make it okay to rant at ya like that. I’m told it makes me seem… aggressive.”

Mako shrugs. “I’d use the word passionate. Then again,” he pauses and smirks, “I’m a hard person to intimidate.” Ironically enough, Jamie is the only “person” that has a chance at intimidating him, but since going on impassioned rants is about the most violent Jamie has been with Mako so far, he’s unlikely to upset Mako even if he tried.

Jamie lets out a huff and a smile before putting down his drink to resume eating.

“But to get back on the original topic…”

Jamie gives him a blank look for a moment as he tries to recall what the original topic even was.

“I think it was twenty, maybe thirty years ago… I was definitely in America at the time. I had a boyfriend back then. He loved the whole ‘leather daddy with a thing for cute shit’ bit.”

Jamie’s blank stare intensifies. They were talking about their histories at some point? _Holy hell,_ _how long ago did we get off topic?_

“I left him because I started realising he was a chaser; tried to feed me meat when he thought I wasn’t paying attention, insisted I should eat more at supper. Anyway, that’s beside the point -- his mum owned a ritzy place just outside of L.A., huge gardens with bird baths galore. My kind of woman -- loved what she did for work so much that it was her hobby, too.”

Silently, he recalls the large flocks of  _ Vanity _ that visited the gardens, harmlessly bathing and chittering amongst themselves. They shared a similar appearance with the local magpie breeds, though their black marks were strikingly iridescent while the white parts and eyes looked as if replaced by solid rubies. Even though they were demons, it was still remarkable to watch them play, fly, and shimmer in California’s persistent sunlight. He found them hanging out in large flocks around the Rutledge Customs garage too, and now, to a much smaller extent, nesting near his library.

“One of my favourite things to do--Dave and I would sit out there in those gardens, drinking beer and just watching the birds. Not much conversation… just beer, birds, the sunset, and each other’s company. So that’s why I got a second chair out here. I’ve always wanted that experience again.”

_ Oh, right, that’s what we were talking about. _ Jamie gives him a sheepish smile. “I wouldn’t say that’s  _ exactly _ what we’re doing right now.”

Mako shrugs dismissively. “No, but I’m loving it all the same.”

Jamie bites his bottom lip to try to hide the smile that instinctively comes to his face as he feels a swell in his chest. He looks down to avoid eye contact, and by doing so he only now realises he wasn’t actually eating, just fidgeting with his fork and playing with his food this whole time.

“Yeah,” he says. “Me too.”

“You full?”

“Oh--” Jamie nearly drops his fork from being suddenly called out. “N-no, I actually barely even started.”

Mako lets out a good-hearted chuckle. “Then quit chattin’ and start eatin’. Once you’re done, I’ll clear all this stuff and you can use the balcony for meditation. I’ve got a yoga mat you can borrow.”

“Aw! That’s sweet of ya. Alright, it’s a deal.”

True to his word, Jamie stops using his mouth for talking and more for chewing. Even then, Mako is still eating by the time Jamie finishes. Piece by piece, the spread on the tray goes missing. Jamie watches curiously over a second mimosa (because there’s always room for more mimosas) and realises that Mako is a surprisingly slow eater. Well, it’s more that he eats at a normal pace, it’s just that he’s eating  _ a lot _ . He portions out delicate, small bites, and spends a significant time chewing thoroughly before swallowing.

Jamie thinks it’s kind of cute. But he also realises that watching someone eat is kind of creepy, so he turns his gaze out to the city while nursing his mimosa. 

A few minutes later, the tray is empty except for dirty dishes. The balcony isn’t quite wide enough to accommodate them side by side, furniture and all, so Jamie stands to step out of Mako’s way so that he can take the tray back to the kitchen.  The two of them can work together to move the patio furniture off of the balcony and into the apartment itself. After digging through his closet for a moment, Mako hands a yoga mat carrier to Jamie, which contains a wonderfully thick mat with pink on one side and purple on the other. It fits just right on the balcony when he rolls it out, and he sits--despite missing a foot--in the full lotus position, overlooking the city.

“Rap on the window if you need anything,” Mako suggests, standing on the other side of the glass door. Jamie gives him a thumbs up and a smile, and Mako shuts the door behind him.

The first thing that Mako attends to is the dishes, lining them up in the machine and then turning it on. After that, he collects Jamie’s clothes in the bathroom and decides to throw them, along with a meagre selection of his own laundry, into the washer/dryer machine before starting it.

Meanwhile, Jamie starts his meditation with a deep inhale and lets his hands idle in the centre of his lap as he straightens his back, then lets out an exhale. At a measured pace, he controls his breathing and lets his wandering thoughts come in like waves, feeling them ebb away with his breaths.

_ I didn’t really want to come here at first, out of fear of what may happen. _

_ Out of fear that my habits would take over. That this would just be the same old song and dance as it is with any other person. _

_ It’s not like Mako wouldn’t have wanted it. He definitely did. _

_ What if turning him down was a mistake? Maybe he agreed to a date because he was assuming it’d end in sex. _

_ But then again… _

_ He didn’t seem that upset. _

_ He’s not making it feel like I’m overstaying my welcome. _

_ He made breakfast, and invited me to meditate on his balcony… _

_ … gave me some time to myself, even in this tiny studio apartment. _

_ Maybe I did the right thing, after all, even if it was hard and felt awkward. _

_ For myself. _

_ For this relationship… _

Jamie’s thoughts are broken when he feels a light weight on his knee. He looks down and sees a  _ Vanity _ perched on him, peering up with interest. It peeps a musical note that sounds like it came out of an 8-bit video game, and Jamie gives it a smile.

It may be a little taboo for one demon to feed on the emotions of another, but who really cares what a Lesser Indulgence and an exiled Sin get up to? Jamie offers his index finger for the  _ Vanity _ to perch, and she hops up without hesitation. He brings her up to his head, and she happily steps down to nest amongst his platinum blonde hair and between his horns. Jamie resumes his posture, revelling in the pride of his accomplishments thus far and moving on to Maharishi meditation, internally repeating a favoured Enochian mantra to himself.

When Mako steps out of the bathroom, he looks out of the window and comes to a full stop when he spots a familiar demon-bird perched on Jamie’s head.  _ “Speak of the devil” indeed.  _ But he’s hardly going to shoo it off, because he has to be honest with himself: he has no idea what goes into a demon meditating. It’s his own business, and he probably is fully aware that there is a bird on his head.

Plus… it’s kind of cute. Mako  _ did _ always enjoy watching  _ Vanity _ , after all, even if he kept wondering if he shouldn’t. The large bird is puffed up and fluffy, indulging in her comfort on Jamie’s head, and the occasional gentle breeze ruffles her feathers and Jamie’s hair.

Mako shrugs to himself and takes a seat at his desk, turning his chair so that he can see himself in the closet door mirrors. He leans an elbow on his desk as he mentally runs through the number of elaborate styles he can do, trying to decide on which one he wants to wear today. After some deliberation, he decides against an elaborate style, and instead settles on doing a regular, basic ponytail. After releasing his hair from its braid, he pulls a drawer open--the one  _ entirely _ dedicated to hair stuff--and spends a few minutes smoothing out his hair with his broad hairbrush from it. He ties up his hair in a high ponytail, reinforcing it with a few more bands to keep it sturdy and provide a solid foundation for decoration. He picks out a bright red fake chrysanthemum, complete with vibrant green leaves, and fastens it to the stem of his ponytail, slightly offset from centre. It stands out gloriously against his white hair.

Even with his hair up like this, it still comes down to his mid-back. Mako brings his ponytail around and runs it over his tattooed knuckles, feeling its healthy, silky-smooth texture against his lips as he presses it to his mouth, staring at himself in the mirror.

And then he notices the striking red eyes of the  _ Vanity _ staring through the window at him.

Mako drops his hair. “Oh, rack off,” he murmurs under his breath, smirking. “No one asked you.”

He throws on a black undershirt and changes into underwear before putting on a dark grey button-up that has its right half covered in a highly detailed and stylised velveteen design reminiscent of a phoenix, and another spreads its wings across his back. The top most button is left undone to reveal an understated silver chain necklace to match the bracelet on his wrist, along with silver rings with black and red accents and gemstones; a double-joint claw ring over his left ring finger stands out even amongst the rest of the bling. To tie it all together, he chooses black jeans with white contrast stitching, two silver zippers over his left thigh, and a belt to hold it all together that drapes layered chain lengths over his hips.

He can see in his mirror that Jamie is still in his lotus position. He doesn’t want to disturb him just to ask how much longer he’ll be, so Mako spins his chair towards his desk and turns on his mounted tablet monitor to get some work done on a project that’s been on the backburner for a while.

Neither of them consciously recognise the time as it passes. Jamie probably would’ve spent a little longer outside if Melbourne didn’t suddenly decide it wanted to take a turn for the colder with a few assertive gusts, and Jamie doesn’t care to wait around for its mind to change again. When he stands up, the  _ Vanity  _ takes off, and he pulls the door open. The sound of it brings Mako’s attention away from his tablet, angled to rest against Mako’s belly so that he doesn’t have to lean over it, and he looks over his shoulder at Jamie.

“Hey. Feeling better?”

“Yeah,” he responds, sliding the door closed behind him. “How long was I out there?”

Mako turns back to his tablet to check the time. “A little longer than an hour, give or take.” Oh, that’s right--Mako points in the direction of the bathroom with the butt end of his stylus. “I washed your clothes from yesterday, they probably just finished.”

“Oh! Uh...where do I find them?”

“Linen closet in the bathroom, can’t miss it.”

Jamie follows as directed and doesn’t have any trouble finding his clothes mixed in with Mako’s. Before he changes into them, however, he first takes a quick rinse in the shower to wash the sweat from sleep and meditation off of him. He comes out of the bathroom to find Mako still absorbed in his work, so he comes up from behind him and rests his pointy chin on Mako’s shoulder.

“Just a sec,” Mako says, when he feels the weight of Jamie on his shoulder. “Let me get to a good stopping point.”

“Sure, sure,” Jamie says, even though he’d be content to just watch and let Mako work. What he sees is CAD software and a half-designed chopper built in it. It’s too early for Jamie to really see where Mako’s vision is going, but it’s fun just to watch him work so deftly with programme familiarity and confidence in his direction.

After a few moments’ passing, Jamie casts his eyes towards the mirror, where he can get a better view of the both of them.

“Hooley Dooley.”

Mako looks up from his tablet. “Hm?”

“Oh, nothin’. It’s just that even when ya dress casually, yer more fashionable than I am even in my wildest dreams.”

Mako chuckles, turning his head to look at Jamie. They’re so close, though, that it makes it difficult to actually  _ see _ him. “We could fix that.”

Jamie scoffs. “Yeah, with what money?”

“Mine,” he answers casually.

There’s a moment of silence and Jamie stands up straight. “That’s not what we agreed on, Mako.”

“We made no agreement in regards to me  _ choosing _ to spend money on you.”

Jamie frowns and backs up to look down at himself and his beat-up clothes. The last time he remembers buying clothes was for work, and they’re the ones that footed the bill. He can’t stand the thought of buying brand-new clothes and then having to cut them up to make clearance for his prosthetics--when it comes to thrift clothes, it doesn’t feel as terrible to butcher them.

“Besides,” Mako continues, “the last time I spent money on someone else besides me was before that hoodie of yours was even brand-new,” he says, as he turns his computer chair around to face Jamie, giving him a smirk. “And if you think you have a say in the matter, you’re sorely mistaken. Outside of uncomfortable pieces, I mean.”

Jamie looks up at Mako without comment, worry stitching wrinkles in his brow as he nibbles on his bottom lip. Mako raises his hand, palm-up, as if he’s asking for Jamie’s.

“Please,” Mako says, putting a little bit of a bartering lilt in his voice. “Let me dress you up.”

With a sigh and an acquiescent smile, Jamie puts his hand in Mako’s. “Alright, fine. If only because I seriously doubt you can make a purse out of this sow’s ear.”

“Excuse  _ you _ ,” Mako says, tightening his hand around Jamie’s and standing up, pulling him in and wrapping his free arm around the small of his back. By doing so, he creates an inescapable trap as he leans in to leave a kiss on Jamie’s forehead. “ _ I’m _ the pig metaphor around here.”

Jamie giggles, faux-struggling in the hold. “Alright, alright! I concede!”

Mako chuckles and lets him go. He turns off his tablet, then goes through his closet and gets a tape measure to take Jamie’s measurements, who--despite his protests--behaves through the whole process.

When they leave the apartment, they do so hand-in-hand.


	6. VI

“Good morning, Jamison.”

Jamie is so enthralled in his schoolwork that the deep, bass voice that greets him from behind startles him. He whips his head around as he jolts, and his vision is immediately and completely consumed by Mako’s waistcoat-covered belly.

He leans over, enveloping the defenceless Jamie as he tucks the other’s head under his chin, thick arms coming around to take Jamie’s wrists to pull his arms into his own chest. Jamie giggles, not fighting against this hug from behind.

“What’re you workin’ on, hm?” Mako asks, bowing his head down and planting a kiss in Jamie’s hair, causing him to giggle again.

“Just some exercises,” he answers honestly.

“You came all the way to  _ this _ library just to do exercises out of your textbook?”

“What?” Jamie asks, grinning. “I happen to  _ like _ this library.” He shrugs, and like a boa constrictor, Mako uses the gesture to tighten his hold, nuzzling the top of Jamie’s head all the while.

“Yeah? Why’s that?”

“It’s got…”

Jamie tilts his head up and nuzzles back.

“Nice…”

Jamie plants a kiss on the underside of Mako’s jaw.

“Sunroofs.”

Mako freezes. He frowns and his eyes narrow. Jamie snickers in response.

“Oh, and the management’s pretty perlah too.”

“That’s good,” Mako sighs, as if in relief. “You should leave them a comment card.”

“Nah. I like tellin’ ‘em in person. Speaking of which…” All joking aside: “I thought ya weren’t here today. Didn’t see ya when I came in.”

“Just restocking the shelves.” Mako stands up straight, releasing Jamie from his hold. In its stead, he just puts his hand in Jamie’s hair, sifting his fingers through it as he talks. “Should’ve texted me when you got here--I’ve always got my phone on me.”

“I thought about it,” he admits, “but I didn’t want it to seem like I was dropping by  _ just _ to see ya. I  _ do _ want to get  _ some _ studying done.”

Mako chuckles, ruffling Jamie’s hair before smoothing it back to its normal, slightly slicked-back state. “In that case, I’ll leave you be. If you need anything, I’ll be here for you.”

“Aw, cheers.” Jamie sits back and leans into the gesture, all smiles. “Thanks mate.”

“It’s nothing,” Mako returns, walking back to the front desk. As much as he’d like to sit around and give Jamie company, he  _ does _ have work to attend to. By the time he returns to the desk, he spots Zarya sitting at her workstation on the other side of the main desk, just having finished clocking in.

“Morning, Zarya. How was your family doing?” he asks, sitting at his own station and causing the computer chair to creak.

“They are fine,” she responds, then turns to look at him with a knowing, cocky smirk on her face as her hands hover over the keyboard. “... But not as well as that date you went on.”

Mako turns to look at her with a dumbfounded expression. How does she know  _ anything _ about the date he went on? She and Jamie didn’t seem that close. A pregnant pause falls between the two of them before Zarya turns her head to look between the stacks, nodding her head in the direction that Jamie is sitting at, indicating she had a clear line of sight to witness that public display of affection from earlier.

Mako swallows. Well, he’s been caught red-handed. “Yeah. We had fun.”

“It is interesting,” she continues. “I have not seen him wear that kind of clothing before…”

They both know that she means that his clothes aren’t beaten up and threadbare, but that’s not all. His usual formula is a graphic tee, a hoodie, and baggy shorts, but right now he’s wearing a tight-fitting, white tank top that shows off just how skinny he is while defining the undercurve of his pectorals. Over it, he wears a black short-sleeve button-up with none of the buttons fastened, sporting two breast pockets, D-ring strap accents, and a very subtle vertical pinstripe pattern that only shows up when the light hits it just right. He’s wearing dark, acid-washed skinny jeans that shamelessly show off the curves of his legs, where one leg has been torn off right before his prosthetic and tastefully distressed.

“Yeah. We went clothes shopping.”

“He looks good,” Zarya comments, sounding almost dreamy.

Mako looks from Jamie back to her with a brow arched. “...I thought you were…” He gestures vaguely.

“Gay as scandalous locker room stories? Of course. But I can appreciate attractive man when he finally puts himself together.”

“Huh.”

_ It’s probably because of some Lilin ability-- _

Mako shakes his head to toss the idea out of his mind. He told himself that he wouldn’t think like that any longer.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Jamie ends up making it a habit to drop by the library just to study. Sometimes he’s only there for an hour or so, and other days it feels like he spends the whole day. Their schedules and workloads don’t line up well enough to make dates a frequent thing, but they spend plenty of time together regardless--texting each other, breaking up Jamie’s studying by having lunch together, and phone calls at night.

The days that Mako worries about are the ones where most of Jamie’s day is spent at the library, curled over his tablet, laptop, or notebooks. He’ll be so focused on his work that he won’t move from his chair for hours, and when Mako approaches, he can hear him mumbling incoherently, his eyes contracted and unfocused. It disturbs some of the library’s patrons--and a few have even had the guts come up to him to complain--but he says this is a public place (despite Mako privately owning it), and as long as he isn’t actively trying to disturb someone, then he can stay.

This phenomenon doesn’t happen very often, only for a couple of days every few weeks; Mako reckons it’s due to exams. Whatever the case may be, he knows Jamie isn’t taking care of himself. He purchases a thermos for water and a box of granola bars the third time he watches it happen, but it’s not in time for that particular incident. The next time it does, though, he’s completely prepared.

“Hey,” he quietly calls out from behind. There’s no response. Mako reaches out and almost touches his shoulder, but decides against it. Instead, he makes his way around the corner of the table to enter Jamie’s peripheral vision at a distance, then closes in on the opposite end of the table. Even as he takes a seat across from Jamie, the other gives him no acknowledgment -- just continued murmuring.

Mako takes one of his granola bars and slowly, quietly, slides it across the notebook Jamie’s hand is resting on, finger pressed against the top of it. The packaging bumps against the prosthetic hand’s pinky finger and starts nudging it toward Jamie, and with enough gentle force the hand starts to shift as well. That’s what it takes to get Jamie’s attention to shift from his tablet to his own hand, the mumbling coming to a stop. His eyes trace the path from the granola bar, up to Mako’s hand, then his arm, his shoulder, his face…

There’s a few long seconds of unfocused staring before Jamie finally smiles at Mako as if he’d been simply sitting here, waiting for the older man to show up. “ _ Mako,”  _ he says with a level of relief in his voice.

“Hey,” Mako says again, a relieved smile coming with it. “Are you going to be okay, Jamie? You seem… out of sorts.”

Jamie gives him a saddened smile and says nothing. He casts his eyes down and, with both hands, reaches out to hold Mako’s extended hand, ignoring the granola bar for now. They spend a few minutes like this, with Jamie clinging to Mako’s hand and kneading it. Mako’s hand is kept slack, allowing Jamie to knit his frustration and anxiety out on it, occasionally squeezing back when he can get an easy hold around Jamie’s flesh hand.

“It’s swot week,” Jamie eventually manages out.

Mako pulls up his other arm to look at his watch; it’s Monday. “Exams are next week,” Mako concludes. Jamie nods. “Why are you so worked up? You’re a bright kid. Your grades are stellar.”

Jamie tries to laugh but he wants to whine; it ends up coming out as a bark, followed up with a shuddering sigh. “Mate, I only tell ya about the good ones.”

Mako is silent for a moment before hazarding the question: “Have you been struggling in school this whole time?”

Jamie just bites his bottom lip.

Mako sighs. He knows it probably makes him sound like he’s disappointed in Jamie--especially from the way Jamie tries to tuck his chin into his own neck--even though that’s not the case. Mako closes his hand around both of Jamie’s and lifts his arm up off the table. Jamie watches him with worried brows as Mako starts clearing the table: closing Jamie’s laptop, closing his textbook and stacking it on top of the laptop, then the same with his notebook. He collects his pencils and highlighters and eraser and tucks them beside the tower of books, and Jamie does nothing to stop him.

With the table cleared, Mako lets Jamie’s arms fall back into place, but while he lets the prosthetic one go, he tugs on the flesh one to bring it closer, practically pulling it across the length of the table. He lifts up Jamie’s elbow and cradles it in the palm of his left hand, while he brings the thumb of his right hand up to his mouth and gives the pad of it a wet lick.

Jamie has no idea what he should be preparing for when Mako reaches down and dives his wet thumb into Jamie’s forearm muscle. He’s met with unsurprisingly tense muscle, but with some assertive, gentle broad strokes, he makes it submit and relax, allowing Mako to run smooth strokes down his arm and into Jamie’s wrist. It’s slow, soft, and rhythmic, and Jamie feels the anxiety seep out of his spine in small doses with every stroke.

“I didn’t know ya knew how ta massage,” Jamie says, as his posture becomes lax.

“Shh,” Mako shushes him gently. “No words, no thoughts. Just focus on how it feels.”

Jamie can’t argue. He can feel his anxious, guilt-ridden thoughts crop up, but they never manage to seed themselves to grow, as if Mako kept re-tilling the soil to destroy the weeds that had already taken root and making sure that no new ones manifest. He usually has the hardest time with this on his own, but Mako’s presence makes it so much easier. At some point, he shifts his prosthetic forearm to rest in front of him, and he uses it as a makeshift pillow so he can only focus on how good this arm massage feels.

Mako can sense that Jamie’s dropped out of his high-anxiety state by the time he moves down to his wrist, giving carefully applied attention to acupressure points along the way. When he speaks in a quiet, library-appropriate voice, his bassy voice still reverberates clearly and would be easy to eavesdrop, but the only other person in the library right now is Zarya and a few older folks using the computers.

“I didn’t do well in school either,” he starts. Jamie opens his eyes, but he doesn’t look at Mako, too comfortable to move.

“I was picked on for my weight. The other kids had all sorts of clever rhyming chants, they clearly spent a lot of time coming up with them. I remember one time they shoved my face into my lunch tray and made pig noises. Stole my glasses and threw them in the river before the teacher asked them to return them.”

Mako carefully omits the nicknames he’d been given when the other kids saw his eyes.

“When my mother died in the floodwaters of the tsunami that hit Akaroa, the kids said that she actually died because I sat on her.”

“ _ Jesus, _ ” Jamie hisses.

Mako lets out a sage hum as he moves down to his hand, massaging the tendons he can feel under his fingers. Thank goodness  _ Lilin _ have the same musculature as humans.

“Hard ta believe it, sitting here now.”

“I didn’t have this muscle--or this height--back then,” Mako retorts, smirking.

“Yeah, alright. That’s fair.”

“The only respite I had was lecture. Instead of paying attention, I would draw on my notes the whole time to cheer myself up. Cars, bikes, animals, people…that’s about when I figured out I wanted to make customs for a living.”

Jamie chuckles. “I do the same thing, actually. Well… I draw myself a lot, and emblems and logos when I can’t focus on anything else.”

Mako can’t help but smile to himself, even though Jamie isn’t looking. He runs Jamie’s long fingers between his thumb and forefinger, starting at the base of each individual finger and pulling down to his fingertips before returning to nurture his palm. It sends pleasant waves down Jamie’s hand and into his body. 

“The day I turned eighteen, I dropped out of school and used part of my mother’s life insurance money to move to America and get a new start. I pulled a small loan and started Rutledge Customs from the ground up.”

“Ya didn’t go ta uni?”

“Nope. Never even considered it. School was a waste of time; I learned better with my hands, on my own terms.”

Jamie slowly sits up, looking more tired and blissed out than the high-strung appearance from just a few minutes ago. He looks over to his pile of school material and sighs.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have gone in the first place…”

“Just because it was a waste of time for me doesn’t mean it’s a waste of time for everyone. You’ll be in a pretty good place as long as you can get through it. That’s what matters, not your grades.”

“I’d think that having made my own working, fully jointed prosthetics would have been more than a paper, but I was wrong about that too.”

Mako shrugs. “Maybe they’re worried that you’re the kind to rest on your laurels.”

Jamie squints his eyes but says nothing.

“How’s this,” Mako offers. “If no place hires you within three months of graduating, I’ll give you a job here. Part time or full time, your choice. Give you enough of a solid ground to work on your own projects, maybe even individual commission, so you can make money doing what you want.”

Jamie looks up at him with hope in his eyes. “Ya mean it, mate?”

“Of course.”

He giggles. “I like that idea.”

“Yeah? Well, how about this one for size: you put down the books and come with me to lunch. You study when we come back until I have to clock out, and then you can come home with me and get your mind off of everything. You’ll be in better mental health if you give yourself some breaks.”

“Oh, Mako.” Jamie’s iconic beaming smile finally comes back to him in full force. “Ya don’t need to flirt with me, we’re already dating.”

Mako lets out a deep, rumbling chuckle, and Jamie feels himself burn red as he smiles.  “Then let’s go; I’m starving.”

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — 

It’s the week after exams, and it’s a wonderfully mild July day. To celebrate the end of the semester, Mako treats Jamie to a very stereotypically Melbourne date: coffee, street art, and food stalls.

It’s a plan that Jamie hatched over the weekend, when he made an offhand comment that Mako must have been inspired by Hosier Lane while going through Mako’s phone to look at more bike pictures while they were cuddled up on his couch. Mako was foolish enough to admit that he’d never been, despite living within walking distance of the general vicinity, which was promptly followed up by Jamie  _ insisting _ that they go. It’s a perfect time of year for outdoorsy activities anyway; Winter brings with it the best of the fluctuating weather Melbourne has to offer.

Mako feels like he’s twenty-something again, walking down the city streets hand in hand with his boyfriend. In his other hand, he holds a frosty frappé sweetened to hell and back. Jamie has a flat white, and sometimes the microfoam gets caught on his upper lip before he licks it off. Mako thinks it’s adorable.

Hosier Lane wastes no time in barraging them with colourful displays once they turn the corner. There’s too much to take in while walking, and Mako finds himself stopping only a few feet in to admire the discordant cacophony of pop icons, nonsensical text, cartoon characters, freaky aliens, whimsical animals, and macabre depictions. Jamie doesn’t push him through it; he allows Mako to choose the pace they go at.

“This place has never looked the same twice,” Jamie comments, looking the opposite direction that Mako is, then he turns to him with a smile on his face. “I love this city.”

“Were you born here?” Mako asks, knowing that the real answer is  _ no, of course not,  _ but whatever backstory Jamie has made for himself is far more important.

“Nah. Adelaide, actually. Moved here for uni, wanted ta upgrade.”

“Fancy that.” If he hadn’t, the two of them probably would have never met. The world seems so suffocatingly large when he thinks of that.

“Why’d  _ you _ choose Melbourne?” Jamie asks.

“No specific reason. It just...felt right, after stranding myself in the bush for half a year. A breath of fresh air after the worst decision of my life.”

“ _ Melbourne _ chose you,” Jamie translates, smirking all-knowingly. Mako turns to him with an arched brow, and Jamie giggles.

With his horns, red skin, and shock-blonde hair, Jamie fits in against the backdrop of graffiti, like he’d crawled out of the layers of paint and built himself from the leather and plastic of the abandoned sneakers hanging over their heads. 

He’d driven past this laneway countless times before without realising that he’d been missing this little pocket of colour and character in the heart of the city. Melbourne was never a city of humdrum people and places; far from it, to be honest. But even out of the crop of popular culture and trendsetting individuals, Jamie still stands out saturated in colour and attitude.

Mako’s mind drifts as Jamie yabbers on about  _ hipster capital of Oz  _ and destiny and somesuch as they turn the corner. Most pieces get a pretty significant portion of his attention, but one against the wall of the car park catches his attention.

It rings of a depiction of Adam and Eve, but with a twist: Eve appears with reddish purple skin, a spaded tail, dark and twisted antelope horns, and yellow eyes. She looks a lot like Jamie’s family--a  _ Lilin _ . She’s holding up a smart phone with some kind of social media website displayed on it, as if she’s showing Adam. Adam, on the other hand, is faceless; he’s in a full suit of armour that is angular and segmented, made of mother-of-pearl and gold gilding, with blue and red ornate details.

_ Odd,  _ Mako thinks.  _ What are they trying to convey here? _

His thoughts are interrupted by the emulated sound of a snapping camera. When he turns his head, he finds Jamie standing some yards in front of him, holding his phone up to take a picture of Mako. He lowers it and gives a cheeky grin.

“Looked good like that,” Jamie comments. “With your head in the clouds.”

“Let’s take a selfie,” Mako suggests, suddenly inspired by Jamie’s sneaky move. Jamie jumps in place at the suggestion, beaming brightly and joining Mako’s side once again. He takes a big swig of his coffee as they back up against a painted wall to take their picture. Jamie holds up his phone, and Mako tilts his head to the side to rest it on top of Jamie’s. In the reflection of their picture, Mako realises that Jamie intentionally left a layer of white microfoam on his lip for the picture.

Some people more emotionally invested in their appearances may have been upset that Jamie tried to ruin what should be a cute, romantic picture, but Mako just finds it funny. Instead of laughing, however, he reaches his hand up from behind to block Jamie’s head from escaping as he quickly leans in for a kiss, trapping that smudge of microfoam in his lips and sucking it off.

And staying for far, far longer than he needs to.

Jamie jolts at first, but even his reflexes don’t get him out of this situation. He’s unable to reciprocate any touches since his hands are full of coffee and phone respectively but he melts into it all the same, sucking on Mako’s lips in turn. They’re so soft and thick, it feels like wrapping oneself in a thick, warm duvet when the weather gets cold.

When they part, Jamie’s head is swirling, feeling like a virgin who’s fallen in love for the first time. Mako grins to himself as he drinks in the enamoured, blissful expression on Jamie’s face and feels like he has to support a little of Jamie’s weight, or else he’d end up collapsing.

“Was that our first kiss?” he asks, unusually quiet in his hushed excitement.

“Wasn’t keeping score,” Mako responds.

“Wanna do it again?”

“Yep.”

So they do.

Some minutes later, when they manage to tear themselves away from each other, they return to scanning every surface of Hosier Lane. Upon completion, the two of them get on Mako’s bike and head over to Queen Victoria Market to do some one-off shopping and food stalls.

“It wasn’t our first kiss,” Mako says, as he helps Jamie put in some new fire opal studs that Mako just bought him. It takes quite a bit of concentration to make sure he’s putting it into the right piercings on his glamour, and not his actual appearance. “We’d kissed in the kitchen, because you were being a cunt who wouldn’t get out of my way.”

“Oh, yeah! I remember that now.” Jamie tries to stand very, very still as Mako changes his jewellry out, displaying a breathtaking amount of dexterity even though a single fingertip is four times the size of the earlobe. “Ya were trying to act like ya were ignorin’ me.”

“You wanted attention,” Mako corrects flippantly, “so I gave you some.”

“Mm-hmm.”

Mako drops his hands and Jamie poses, with his hands fanning out at the sides of his face. “How do I look?”

“It’s your colour,” Mako answers, taking out his phone and snapping a quick picture for Jamie’s reference.

“Aw, aces! They’re so pretty,” he comments, angling the phone while Mako still holds it to take in the picture. The laneway makes a beautiful background for Jamie’s bright face. The lighting is a soft-intensity orange that suits the warm colours of Jamie’s amber eyes and platinum-blonde hair, and now his new bright orange and white ear studs. With the task completed, he lets his eyes relax and Jamie’s real appearance manifests again.

“Thank you, Mako,” Jamie says, reaching up to wrap his arms around Mako’s neck and give him a kiss on the cheek.

“No problem.” Mako returns the hug one-handed. “They suit you.”

They head down a few more stalls, half-looking for something to eat for dinner, half-just enjoying the scenery, letting conversation grow and wane comfortably.

When they run across a couple, a man and a woman not  _ quite _ making out in public but looking like they’re about to, Jamie turns to Mako with a slight frown on his face.

“I’ve been meanin’ ta ask…”

Mako turns his head to look at him.

“Now that we’re kinda… ya know, a proper thing now… are you okay with me sleeping around?” He starts fidgeting with his hands, suddenly unable to keep eye contact out of fear of what the answer might be.

Mako shrugs, almost no hesitation in his answer: “Of course.”

Jamie’s head shoots back up to look at him again. “Really? Seriously, you’re just automatically okay with it? No negotiation, no need to talk about it?”

“Yep.”

Jamie almost trips over his own foot in the process of staring at Mako so intently. “You’re fuckin’ with me.”

Mako gives him a half-laugh. “I mean it, Jamie. I remember when I was your age; I couldn’t keep up with me back then. A fat man pushing fifty isn’t going to provide everything you need.”

Jamie gives him an incredulous half-smile. “Crikey, how slutty do you think I am?”

“You’re as slutty as you need to be, Jamie, and I’m okay with that. Really. If I wasn’t, I would’ve stopped you from taking that walk-of-shame either leaving or coming back to my condo and waking me up at ungodly hours in the morning.”

Jamie’s face immediately turns beet-red. He was caught red-handed making trips to  _ Pleiades _ and he had absolutely no idea; he doesn’t even know what to say. His breathing feels constricted and difficult.

“Honestly, I’d been meaning to ask you to do that a lot earlier in the night. I don’t mind you coming home late but leaving in the middle of the night feels weird as fuck.”

Jamie’s mouth moves to try to form a sentence, but his head is so full of panic that he can’t even get a word out. Mako holds up a hand, as if to placate him.

“If that still makes it work, I mean. Don’t mean to make it harder.”

“No, no, noactuallyearlierworksalotbetter,” Jamie stammers. It was all under the assumption that Mako wasn’t going to wake up if he left after Mako fell asleep. That sleep mask makes it hard to make absolutely sure, apparently.

Mako comes to a full stop and points his thumb to a food stall that advertises vegan cuisine, looking at Jamie to seek his approval. Instead, he just stands there like a dingo in headlights.

“... Jamie,” Mako asks slowly, “are you having a panic attack?”

“I think so,” he says, frozen solid to his spot.

Mako lets out an even breath and approaches Jamie, stepping behind him and wrapping his arms around his midsection, uttering a quiet “breathe with me,” and they stand there together as Mako leads him through some breathing exercises while Jamie clings to his arms and lets Mako’s bulk absorb the occasional shivers that run through him.

“I didn’t mean to upset you,” Mako explains when he feels that Jamie’s heartbeat has returned to normal levels. “I was hoping talking about it like that would avoid it.”

“It’s not you,” Jamie explains. “I could’ve ruined our relationship, tryin’ ta sneak behind yer back like that and failin’.”

“I knew what you were doing this whole time. Like I said, I would’ve stopped you or chewed you out if I wasn’t okay with it… and I am. I just want you to stop waking me up in the middle of the night.”

Jamie giggles, giving Mako’s arm a squeeze, indicating that he’s ready to be let go. “Alright. I’ll try not to.”

“You feel up for eating?” Mako asks, releasing his hold only to take up Jamie’s hand once again. “This vegan place sounds interesting.”

“Oh, yeah, I’m starving. Let’s save room for dessert though! I saw a gelato place earlier I wanted to try.”

“I  _ always _ have room for dessert,” Mako says with a smirk.

Jamie, endlessly amused by the menu and all of the quirky names they’ve made to indicate the vegan status of their items, ends up ordering soup and salad, and Mako orders what is basically spaghetti and not-meatballs in tomato sauce.

In the process of eating, Jamie ends up giving some heavy consideration to something that he had noticed before, but honestly hadn’t thought consciously about it before. Even though Mako is eating spaghetti, which normally is a sloppy meal by virtue of itself, he still cuts the meatballs in tiny segments and twirls small amounts of noodles to go with it. He doesn’t know  _ anyone _ , even working as a waiter, that is such a dainty eater.

When they get their gelato, it’s even worse. The tiny little spoons they’re given are absolutely dwarfed in Mako’s hands, yet he makes equally tiny little scoops out of his salted caramel and dark chocolate gelato before sucking it down. As Jamie watches, Mako, with particular slowness, carves a valley in his gelato and brings it to his mouth, letting the treat melt in his mouth before he draws back on the spoon, the curve of his lips casually pulls out with the friction, bouncing back into place when there’s no spoon left to suck on.

Jamie licks his own lips and swallows hard.

Mako’s head whips over to Jamie with no warning.

“I  _ knew _ it,” he declares. “You’re a feeder!”

“W-what?!” Jamie says, startled by this sudden accusation. “I-I’m not like that, mate! The way ya eat is just--it’s cute!”

“Cute. Uh-huh…” Mako doesn’t sound like he believes him at all. “I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve caught you watching me eat. This isn’t some revelation you’ve had just now.”

_ Oops. _ Jamie gives him a silent, self-conscious yet cheeky grin. Caught red-handed twice in one day--It’s an all-time new low! 

Mako nudges his cup of gelato across the table and turns the spoon around for Jamie to take it by the stem. Then, to his horror, he watches Mako open his mouth to him.

“Mako! We’re sitting in the middle of people right now,” Jamie hisses, under his breath.

“Something tells me you don’t really mind that. Hurry up, I’m still hungry.”

_ Bossy for a bloke I keep turning down sex with,  _ Jamie thinks bitterly, but he’s right. This setup has an awfully nice appeal that he can’t deny, so he swallows down a little bit of his self-control and feeds the pig, relishing the way his mouth wraps around that itty-bitty spoon and the occasional moan of pleasure that follows him swallowing. Jamie lets out a slow exhale some moments later, realising only now that he’d been holding his breath as he fixates on watching Mako eat right from his hand. He can’t see his past his glasses, but that doesn’t stop Jamie from picturing a pair of beautiful brown eyes rolling back with pleasure.

Mako’s probably just trying to turn Jamie on so that he’ll give in later tonight… and that thought just makes Jamie want to be harder to get.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — 

Jamie handles the second semester much better.

Mako still has to keep an eye on him, because even when he’s not suffering from anxiety, he can get fixated on his workload and forget to take care of himself. Thankfully, Mako always has granola bars and his thermos of cold water at the ready.

It’s not until mid-semester exams where things get rocky again.

 

**Jamie**

_ 01:28 August 15 _

You awake?

I know it’s a stupid hour and I’m sorry if I ended up waking you up with this message

 

**Mako**

_ 01:31 _

Shit I didn’t realise what time it was…

Been on a design binge tonight.

What’s going on?

 

**Jamie**

_ 01:34 _

I’m sorry! You should go to bed.

Good night!

 

**Mako**

_ 01:35 _

Jamie.

 

**Jamie**

_ 01:35 _

*sigh*

I was just looking for a distraction.

Phantom pains…

They’ve been really bad the last few days.

 

**Mako**

_ 01:36 _

Just a distraction?

Is there anything else I can help with?

Anything I can bring you?

 

**Jamie**

_ 01:36 _

Um…

Smoko, lol

JK :P

If you could talk to me until I sleep...that’d be nice

 

**Mako**

_ 01:37 _

I’ll do it.

 

**Jamie**

_ 01:37 _

What?

 

**Mako**

_ 01:37 _

I’ll do it.

I know where to get some at this hour.

Someone owes me a favour.

 

**Jamie**

_ 01:38 _

?????????

You don’t need to do that, Mako!

 

**Mako**

_ 01:38 _

I’ll pick you up at the top of the hour.

 

**Jamie**

_ 01:39 _

You’re really doing this aren’t you

I don’t get a say?

 

**Mako**

_ 01:39 _

Nope.

Pack your peripherals and wait for me by the usual bus stop.

 

**Jamie**

_ 01:40 _

This is the most aggressive form of affection I’ve ever seen

I’m into this.  
  


Mako is exactly on time, his bike in a low gear to keep things quiet as he navigates to the student village. Jamie is there, and even in the dim ambient light Mako can see the poor guy’s lost all of his colour. It’s a lot worse than he was making it sound.

Mako wordlessly scoots back in his seat and pats the open space for Jamie to help himself. With just as many words, Jamie takes up the seat, and they head to Mako’s apartment together.

When they get back, Mako leads Jamie to sit outside. He helps the other take off his prosthetics, then bolsters the chair with a few pillows and wraps his  _ Aggretsuko _ blanket around him.

“Your blanket is gonna smell skunky,” Jamie warns.

“Doesn’t matter,” Mako gruffly reassures, then holds out his hand. “What’d you bring?”

Jamie shifts to the side to go through his pockets, and digs out a blown glass pipe and a lighter. Mako takes them both and shifts the other chair so that the table is no longer sitting between them. Mako pulls out his bag before taking his own seat, using the table beside him to pack the pipe before handing it back to Jamie. It’s a little awkward, but they eventually figure out a way that Jamie can hold the pipe while Mako acts as his other arm and lights up.

They sit there in silence for a while, hitting it hard until Jamie’s colour comes back and his head lolls to the side, resting against the fluff of a pillow.

“You need anything?” Mako asks quietly.

“Could do with something to eat…”

“What are you in the mood for?”

“Something light… Got that broccoli and ranch?”

“Yeah.” Mako gets up and heads to the kitchen, preparing a plate full of broccoli and ranch dressing for Jamie, and pouring a glass of icewater to go with it. When he returns outside, he places the plate on Jamie’s lap for easy access, but holds the glass to keep it safe until Jamie indicates that he wants it.

“Thank you,” Jamie says, some minutes after slowly feeding himself the leafy veggies. “For everything, I mean. Being there for me when things get rough.”

“You’re welcome,” Mako responds, “but you don’t need to thank me for anything. You’ve done the same thing for me.”

Jamie scoffs. “I don’t remember helping you through any crises or panic attacks. Or giving you massages.”

“It’s more subtle than that, Jamie.”

Mako reaches over and places his hand on Jamie’s thigh. They sit in silence for a few quiet, tender moments, while Mako tries to figure out how he wants to say it.

“I’m lonely,” is what he ends up landing on. Jamie looks at him curiously.

“I’m not very talkative. Sometimes there are conversations where I don’t do anything but say nothing or grunt. I’m told that I always look like I’d rather be somewhere else. Most people only talk to me when they need to.”

Jamie thinks about this for a while. “I’ve seen that,” he admits, as he places his hand on top of Mako’s. “But it doesn’t bother me. I figure you’re busy or don’t want to talk, but that doesn’t mean you don’t want to  _ listen _ or want company.”

Mako feels a swelling in his chest as he looks at Jamie. He’s put it far better than Mako ever could.

“Yeah. You’d be surprised how many people don’t get that. When you’ve been staying with me during your school breaks… I’m at my happiest.”

Jamie smiles brightly. He still feels like Mako is doing more for him than he is in exchange, but it makes him feel better to know that it’s not as much of a one-way street as he thought.

“Hey. Can you move me so I can sit in your lap?” he asks.

Mako hesitates. “It won’t be as comfortable.”

“I don’t give a shit.”

Mako grins and shrugs. “Suit yourself,” he says, moving Jamie’s plate off of his lap and onto the table, then reaching over to move Jamie’s body.  _ Sitting on his lap _ is a little bit of a misnomer, as the vast majority of Mako’s lap is taken over by his own belly, but the two of them are comfortable enough with proximity that Jamie has no issue sandwiching himself between the belly and his legs, his lower back over one knee and his thigh over the other. Mako’s thick, muscled arm provides support behind the rest of his back while Jamie rests his cheek on Mako’s thick pectoral.

“You should have some too,” Jamie offers.

“I’m not hungry,” he responds.

“Nah, mate, I mean the other green stuff.”

“You had your fill?”

“Probably not, but I’d feel better if I wasn’t doin’ this solo.”

Mako sighs. He’d rather cook it into something than smoke it, but it’s far too late for an endeavour like that.

“Alright,” he says, reaching for the grinder and pipe. Jamie takes the lighter. “But if I start a coughing fit, I’m throwing you off this balcony.”

Jamie giggles. After Mako grinds and packs the pipe, Jamie returns the favour of being his extra hand, and--thankfully--there are no coughing fits, despite how much they threaten to come up. After a few more hits, both of them sit there, too high and tired to make much conversation. Before either of them manage to actually fall asleep, however, Mako retains just enough consciousness to remember to carry them both to bed.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — 

**Jamie**

_ 15:02 December 10 _

:( Dammit…

I was going to go downstairs to swim for the first time in forever

And I found out my bather’s elastic is totally dead.

[Jamie uploads a picture of himself in the mirror, wearing a tank top and the bathers in question; he’s holding out the waistband in a way reminiscent of those “I lost x pounds on this nutritional system” commercials.]

I guess I could go in some dark boxers?

Think that’ll work?

 

**Mako**

_ 15:03 _

Are you sure you’re not bragging about your recent weight loss?

 

**Jamie**

_ 15:04 _

Ha ha.

 

**Mako**

_ 15:04 _

As long as it’s some thick fabric it should work in a pinch.

Do you want me to buy new ones for you?

 

**Jamie**

_ 15:06 _

Uh...sure

Surprise me? ;D

I like your taste in clothes, reckon it extends to bathers too.

 

**Mako**

_ 15:39 _

Sending it to your post box.

Let me know when you get it.

 

**Jamie**

_ 11:45 December 13 _

Oh my God.

Has anyone told you that you’re a dirty old man?

 

**Mako**

_ 11:45 _

???

What’s wrong?

 

**Jamie**

_ 11:56 _

[Jamie sends a picture of himself in the bathers that Mako bought him. The top-down view of the angle gives a very exaggerated view of Jamie’s ab muscles, and even though the picture is very intentionally angled to tantalise, he has his tongue stuck out in a cheeky expression.

As for the bathers themselves, they’re a pair of skin-tight jammers. They’re mostly black, but on the side there is a very ornate, abstract design made of faded cool greys and bold blues. They leave very little to the imagination, practically highlighting every muscle in Jamie’s full leg, and cutting off just before Jamie’s bare stump.]

 

**Mako**

_ 11:57 _

Oh fuck.

Shit

_ 12:11 _

Guilty as charged, I guess.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:31 _

???

 

**Mako**

_ 12:32 _

“Dirty old man”.

In my defence…

For a bloke that reportedly puts out really easily, you are the worst tease I’ve ever met.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:32 _

Oh!

I get it now :3c

There’s more where that came from…

 

**Mako**

_ 12:33 _

Don’t you dare.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:35 _

[Jamie sends another picture at a similar angle. He’s clearly gone swimming since the last picture, considering his skin is soaked with droplets and the jammers have taken a slightly darker colour to them. There’s some kind of black prosthetic on his leg, now hiding any visible flesh on that leg, but it’s hard to make out any details other than the colour. This picture doesn’t have Jamie’s face in it; the most that is visible is his mouth, and he’s got a nasty little smirk that he’s sucking his bottom lip in for, upper teeth showing.

He’s wearing a different prosthetic on his arm too, a sleek black number that has some kind of scuba fabric-like sock that comes halfway up his bicep, a similar material that connects his fingers together like webbing. Said prosthetic is reaching into his jammers, using his thumbs to stretch out the waistband and give a view of the fine, blonde hair that normally hides below his waistline. Thanks to the lighting there’s a little hint of the base of his member.]

 

**Mako**

_ 12:36 _

Fuck you.

Fuck you and the six-pack you walked in with.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:36 _

I’ll give you a few minutes to let that...sink in.

 

**Mako**

_ 12:37 _

Yeah thanks.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:42 _

Wanna settle the score?

Send us a pic?

 

**Mako**

_ 12:44 _

I can.

I just need a few minutes.

 

**Jamie**

_ 12:45 _

Take your time!

 

**Mako**

_ 13:01 _

[Mako sends a picture of himself in his condo, as reflected off the mirror of his closet.

He’s naked, laid out on his bed, with the afternoon sky behind him past the windows. He’s laying on his back, and his back is arched to really emphasise the swell of his belly, his leg tastefully placed to censor his genitals. His arms are up, over his head, accentuating their muscles as one hand is preoccupied with holding his phone so that it’s conveniently covering his eyes. His hair is everywhere, but in graceful, cascading strands over the bed and draped over his arms.

There’s a bottle of lube and a string of franger packets beside him. Two packets are separated and opened.]

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:03 _

Holy fuck.

 

**Mako**

_ 13:05 _

[Because he’s generous, he sends a second picture. This one is of him laying on his stomach, chest against the bed and ass in the air. He bites one finger with a shy, demure expression as his hair is gathered over his shoulder, framing what’s going on with his mouth. Again, his leg is positioned just right to keep him decent, and his phone is blocking his eyes. Despite his posture, there’s no clearance between his belly and the surface of the bed.]

_ 13:07 _

[A third picture depicts just his back, his rolls making for rather enjoyable topography as he raises his arm to run it under his hair, draping over his shoulders and back. He’d use both arms, but one of them has to be preoccupied with the phone.]

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:07 _

Stop stop stop my dick is about to explode

Holy shit

Mako you’re the hottest thing to walk on this planet

 

**Mako**

_ 13:08 _

Shut up and wank, Jamie.

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:09 _

I’m on it!

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:28 _

[Jamie sends a picture of himself, back in his dorm room. He’s naked, looking slightly tired, skin slick with sweat, but with a sweet smile on his face. Most of his picture is his face, really, as he lays belly-down in his bed, head turned to the side for the picture.]

Was it as good for you as it was for me?

 

**Mako**

_ 13:30 _

You’re cute.

 

**Jamie**

_ 13:30 _

Thanks, but you are too.

Oh, I got totally distracted from what I wanted to say before…

My friends and I, the ones that don’t have family or can’t go home for the holidays

We spend Christmas at the beach together

Barbecue, games, swimming…

Would you like to come?

It’d mean a lot to me if you did.

But you’d also be the oldest person of the lot if you did…

And you’d have to bring your own veggo food

So I’d understand if you didn’t want to.

 

**Mako**

_ 13:31 _

Actually, that sounds nice.

I don’t have any other plans.

I’d love to.

  
  



	7. VII

In the days leading up to Christmas, Mako has convinced himself that what he’s agreed to is a terrible idea.

Going to the beach? In Melbourne? For Christmas? He’s been by Beach Road on the holidays and seen the crowds, like a nest of ants that broke out upon an abandoned picnic spread. Mako is comfortable only amongst handfuls of people at most; he wants room to spread out and enjoy himself. Most importantly, he wants enjoy Jamie’s company, maybe get acquainted with some friends he hasn’t met yet, have food, and chill out. 

He doesn’t want to deal with lines, or screaming kids, or his space being invaded by clueless people, but he decides not to go back on his word. He doesn’t even voice his concerns, because he wants to spend the holidays with Jamie, he doesn’t want to take Jamie away from his friends, and Jamie doesn’t deserve to feel guilty for making Mako do something he’s not thrilled about.

They’ve been dating for nine months now, and if this is the first thing that Mako feels like he’s had to sacrifice for Jamie’s happiness, it’s a pretty good score so far.

There’s some Christmas specials on telly, but the volume is down low while the two of them work on decorating a fake tree they had bought together. It’s just a plain one, no taller than two feet tall, and Jamie insisted that they hand-make small ornaments for it together. Since it meant spending more time together at the craft store, Mako agreed.

While an incense stick of pine and clove burns, Jamie glues brightly-coloured cloth pom-poms to a string, while Mako puts fishing line through shiny beads that were originally intended to make necklaces. Jamie hums bits and pieces of Christmas carols, and even though he never starts at the beginning (or finish at the end,) Mako genuinely enjoys the background noise.

Even if the day of Christmas itself may be crowded and hectic, at least the two of them can enjoy the bulk of Jamie’s time off like this.

When they’re done, Jamie hatches a plan and digs through his backpack. He pulls out a mechanical drafting pencil that has a toy mama koala and her baby clinging to it -- while it does make the pencil slightly harder to use, it was the end result of Jamie getting tired of losing his expensive drafting equipment among the chaos of his desk.

He bends the arms open a little bit to release the drafting pencil from the koala’s grip, then closes her arms around the most upright branch of the tree to top it.

Mako’s half-tempted to suggest that there’s more that they could do to the tree to make it more stereotypically more Ozzy, like thong- and surfboard-shaped ornaments, but instead he settles on:

“That’s the most confused koala I’ve ever seen.”

Jamie gives him a curious glance, and Mako lets a beat pass before he gestures to it.

“That’s not even remotely close to a eucalyptus tree.”

Jamie giggles, then pushes himself up from his position on the floor to sit on the couch. He leans into Mako’s side, grinning the whole time, even as he leans in to peck Mako on the lips.

“Happy Christmas, Mako.”

“Happy Christmas,” he returns, along with the kiss. The rest of their evening is quiet and lovely, with a meatless turkey dinner.

The next morning, Mako wakes up with anxiety already in his belly. Since they had packed the night before, he doesn’t get a chance to stew in it any longer than how long it takes to have a light breakfast, get dressed, and pick up their things. They have more stuff than the chopper can carry, so they choose to call a cab to drive them to their destination.

Mako distracts himself with games on his phone and holding Jamie’s hand, who stares out of the window at the passing scenery while he bounces his leg.

The ride takes a lot longer than Mako was expecting, especially considering that he really doesn’t live that far from Beach Road to begin with. When he looks out the window, he sees...the suburbs?

Mako looks curiously at Jamie. “Where exactly are we going?”

“A friend’s renting a vacation home,” he responds, and a sense of relief immediately washes over Mako. That means they’re going to a private beach and, hopefully, will avoid the sardine-packed shores of the public beaches. This also explains how Jamie thought they were going to do barbecue at the same time.

The cab drops them off at the beginning of a long, unpaved drive, and Mako can feel the ocean air and the noise of the waves even though the view is blocked by houses and vegetation. Cars are parked in the yard to keep the narrow drive clear and walkable, tucked under the shade of tall, well-manicured trees. There’s a little bit of a walk to get to the house itself. Mako immediately recognises it as their destination when he spots Zarya’s shock-pink hair over a well-trimmed hedge.

The screen front door is unlocked and Jamie invites himself in. Mako has to shimmy in sideways in order to fit through, and even that proves to be difficult.

“Jamison!” a feminine voice yells, cheer in her voice even though she’s trying to sound angry. “You’re late!” Her accent is undeniably British.

Jamie drops everything he’s holding right then and there in order to embrace a thin, pixie-cut brunette that only comes up to his sternum. She’s already wearing a bright sky blue one-piece swimsuit that is almost two pieces with the dramatic cut-outs on the sides. Both of them squeeze each other hard, as if they haven’t seen each other in ages.

“I am _exactly_ on time, thank you very much!”

The woman giggles, and Jamie breaks the hold so that he can step aside and gesture to Mako.

“This is Mako, my boyfriend! Mako, this is Tracer, the fastest lesbian on two legs.”

Despite the odd introduction, Mako puts a few of his things down so that he can shake Tracer’s hand, which is immediately dwarfed in his own. “You _are_ as big as he said you were!”

“Glad to live up to expectations,” Mako cordially responds. 

“Go ahead and put your food in any red cooler outside,” Tracer invites, then breaks off the handshake to grab Jamie by the wrist to drag him outside. “Jamie’s gotta get to work, there are already people starving!”

Mako silently observes that Tracer and Jamie have extremely similar builds -- slim and athletic -- and he finds his mind wandering, thinking about how nice it would be to wrap his hands around those tiny ankles and suck on her smooth calves…

Mako catches himself in the daydream, violently shaking his head to bring him back to reality. It’s so bizarre; with the exception of Jamie, Mako doesn’t remember the last time he had such lecherous thoughts about someone else. _Jamie said she’s a lesbian, for fuck’s sake…_

After he puts the rest of his stuff down, he digs through the things they brought to collect the food. He doesn’t find the red coolers she was referring to until he steps onto the back porch, where a handful of late-college age people are.

On one end of the porch, Tracer, Jamie, and a slightly older woman who stands just under Jamie’s chin, with dark skin and black hair ornamented with gold beads, all stand beside an extra-large coal barbie as Jamie fires it up. The two women cast glances at Mako at precisely the same second, with matching expressions that pierce through him and send a cold bolt down his spine. He notices the partial wadjet tattoo under the older woman’s eye in that moment, and he tries not to let this bizarre moment linger for too long; he gives them a friendly nod instead of a wave before approaching the coolers and finding space for his food.

There’s a whistle from the other side of the porch, where a large table is set up with an umbrella. Zarya has spotted him through the crowd, and is now leaning backward to wave him over. Before he stands up from his crouched position over the cooler, he feels a hard, cold, wet sensation against his thick bicep. He looks up and finds the dark-skinned woman offering him an ice-cold bottle of VB, complete with melting ice chips sliding down its sides. She’s wearing a dark blue two-piece that is just straps where it can be tasteful  and a gold-leaf pattern everywhere else, exposing her casually well-built abdomen. She complements the bathing suit with dark blue gladiator platforms, which add about two inches to her already impressive height.

It’s a mouth-watering sight in this heat.

“Fareeha,” she offers with a smile.

“Mako,” he returns, taking the VB.

“Beach is open,” she tilts her head over her shoulder, “and there’s a vegetable and fruit platter on the table. Bedroom down the hall is the designated changing area. Make yourself at home.”

Her words, despite feeling militaristically instructional, are nonetheless friendly; an odd combination, but he doesn’t find it off-putting. He gives her a nod of understanding and decides to check in on Zarya first and foremost, whose presence -- now that he thinks about it -- comes to him as a surprise. Despite the crowd, there are still open seats, and it’s probably because those that are standing are currently soaking wet.

Zarya is dressed in an basic, dark grey athletic two-piece, and there’s a smaller, chubby girl of Chinese descent sitting as close as possible to Zarya’s side, with her nose in her phone.

“Rutledge! Is “business casual” the least-dressed you can manage?” she asks, mock-chastising in her tone. Mako looks down at himself -- his tucked-in white button-up with embroidered roses and sprawling thorns on the shoulders is hardly beach-wear, but…

“I didn’t want to steal the show as soon as I walked in,” he responds, grinning at Zarya. “I’ll break out the budgie smuggler when it’s time.”

“ _Budgie?_ ” asks someone in the peanut gallery.

“Yeah, nah. Macaw _at least,_ ” suggests someone else.

Mako chuckles. Alright, he doesn’t feel nearly as awkward now; _everyone_ at this party is horny as could be; he’s not feeling the age gap as much as he was fearing. He takes a swig of his beer, then turns back to Zarya.

“Who’s your friend over there?” he asks, fully aware of the answer but looking for a proper introduction.

“Ah!” Zarya lifts her arm to reveal a bit more of her, but she immediately tries to retreat into Zarya’s side. She’s wearing a frilly, white and ice-blue one piece, and Mako supposes she’s cute, but he’s never found shyness to be very appealing, given his own propensity to be a man of few words.

“This is Mei,” Zarya tries to introduce her, but Mei won’t drop her phone. “She’s my girlfriend.”

“Not much one for parties?” he asks.

“She was life of party before Jamie showed up,” Zarya offers, somewhat weakly.

This seems like unwanted territory, and while Mako isn’t one to make a scene, Mei seems to be making enough of one on her own. “Not a fan, I take it?”

Mei finally speaks up, only giving Zarya enough time to open her mouth but add nothing else. “I don’t like men who hit on my girlfriend.”

“That does not mean you can be rude to Mako,” Zarya says, hushed and off to the side.

“I don’t trust anyone that willingly touches that walking bag of diseases.”

A hush falls over the crowd.

Mako draws his thumb up the length of his beer, collecting the water droplets on his fingernail. There’s a pretty significant chance that Jamie has slept with the majority of people at this party, even if he doesn’t know it for a fact, and he’s perfectly fine with that being the case. It’s not a point of contention, so Mako simply changes the subject:

“Zarya, I’m surprised that you’re not spending the holidays with your family.”

The woman in question seems relieved to have the subject changed.

“Ah, that is because we do not celebrate Christmas until January back home,” she answers.

That’s right. “I’d forgotten about that,” he admits.

“I take advantage of it,” she continues. “My girlfriend is...not welcome at home, so I am glad to be able to spend holidays with her as well.”

“Clever. It’s a shame that she doesn’t seem to fully appreciate this rare opportunity.”

There’s a murmur that rumbles amongst the crowd. Mako brings up his beer, half to take a swig of it, half hiding his shit-eating grin while Mei stares at him like he’d just stuck her up on a butcher’s hook.

Zarya’s expression is complicated, like someone who appreciates the backup but isn’t looking forward to the inevitable conversation to be had in private later in the day. Still, she nudges Mei a little bit to bring her attention to her.

“Please. Christmas is not for grudges, Mei. Jamie and Mako are good people. --And Mako is my boss. He deserves your respect.”

Mei looks at Zarya and then a few select people in the crowd of which Mako can only assumes she holds in high esteem. With the burn of their expectant stares, she huffs and mutters something under her breath, then puts her phone away even if she just ends up wrapping herself around Zarya’s upper arm.

The conversation turns more amicable when someone interjects a few of their own questions directed at Mako -- given that he’s the odd man out in a group of classmates, he expects to answer questions like _where did you meet Jamie_ and the ones that follow. Despite his short answers, the crowd doesn’t seem intimidated by him.

After a bit of conversation and getting to know Jamie’s friends a little better, he feels a mechanical hand rest on his shoulder while Jamie leans over him, holding a huge tray full of barbecued food in a single hand. There’s a clamour to get at it with sporadic cheers from others. A quarter of the food is already missing by the time the tray actually gets to the table, and Jamie leans further own to quietly talk to Mako:

“Wanna hit the water since we already ate?”

“Read my mind,” Mako agrees; he’s been awfully social, so he could use a breather.

Mako excuses himself from the table and the two of them head inside. On the way, he dumps his empty beer bottle in the recycling. Even though there’s only one room designated for changing, they decide to share it because...well, why not. They’re back-to-back during the process, so there are minimal distractions.

Mako’s just about finished when Jamie calls out, “Mako? Can you help me with my prosthetics?”

He turns around to find Jamie sitting on the edge of the bed, successfully transferred into his jammers. The sleek black web-fingered prosthetic is hanging limply by the rubber gasket that keeps his contacts dry, and he hasn’t even had a chance to try his leg.

“Sure. How do you usually manage to get it on by yourself?”

“Clever use of a wall corner,” he admits. “Or a friend.”

“Fair enough. So, how do I do this?”

Jamie holds out his stump arm. “Put one hand on my elbow, then take the forearm with your other and angle it ‘til it looks right, then just feel it out from there and push. You’ll know when you feel it.”

Mako does as he’s instructed. It’s easy to figure out, but he has to use a surprising amount of strength to actually get the contacts to click into place; he’s afraid of hurting Jamie in the process, but he doesn’t even flinch.

“Your normal prosthetics don’t have that much resistance.” He’s never put them on, but he’s helped take them off, and it’s not even remotely close.

Jamie giggles, then hands Mako his leg prosthesis as he rotates to allow him access to his thigh. “Yeah, give it a few years. These are brand new, just finished making them a few months ago. The contacts will go easier with time.”

“Makes sense.”

He takes a moment to observe the leg prosthetic. It’s finned in a way that reminds him of a kayak paddle, but significantly thinner. Like the arm, he takes a hold of Jamie’s hip to hold it in place as he pushes the prosthetic leg into place, while Jamie rotates and flexes the joints of his arm to test it. Once the leg is in place and the gasket secure around his thigh and under the hem of his jammers, Jamie raises his arms up to hook them behind Mako’s thick neck, and when Mako stands up he ends up helping Jamie upright as well.

Jamie plants a kiss on Mako’s lips and he can’t help but smile and give a deep, chesty chuckle. “You’re welcome.”

“Ever tell you I love your laugh?”

“Only my laugh?”

“Well…” Jamie chuckles, then makes a point to let his eyes fall downward. “Among other things.”

His hand travels down and out, pushing back in and up to push up a generous more-than-handful of the fat that makes up Mako’s breast as if Jamie’s hand had suddenly taken on the role of a push-up bra. He gives Mako’s nipple a hard, considerate stare as it, and its piercing, get caught on the soft edge of the webbing between Jamie’s prosthetic thumb and finger.

“Looks like I’m the only one changing hardware today, huh?”

Mako gives a half-hearted shrug. “I’ll do it for special occasions.”

“What, and _Christmas_ isn’t special enough?”

Mako can only smirk. “Happens every year.”

“Then I have no choice but to come up with a way to make this one special.” Jamie looks back up at Mako as he lets go of his breast to let it flop back into place, then nods his head towards the bedroom door. Taking the hint, Mako turns around to head out of the door, but before he can move through the doorframe, Jamie hooks a finger into the waistline of Mako’s neon pink tiger print smugglers and gives it a quick pull before snapping it back into place, startling Mako and sending a mild ripple through his frame.

“Fuckin’ _imp,_ ” Mako growls playfully, and Jamie giggles.

Mako picks up their abandoned beach equipment from the living room, handing Jamie whatever makes for an awkward holding situation. He thinks he’s about to get past the gaggle of people on the porch without comments...and technically he does. When he gets halfway to the boardwalk that leads down to the sand, joyful and uproarious hooting and hollering breaks out from the crowd. With these kinds of reactions, there’s always a chance that they mean it with ill intent, but it’s a moot point for Mako.

As best as he can while encumbered, he bows as if on stage. Jamie, ever on cue for the improv, gestures towards Mako with a flourish with the closed beach umbrella. Some of the shouting turns into laughter, and Mako stands back up with a cocky smirk and heads towards the boardwalk with his hype man in tow.

The two of them set up some distance from the water: two beach loungers and their towels draped lengthwise on them, separated only the pole of the umbrella well-secured in a dug hole with some small bricks for extra confidence. Jamie digs around in their shared bag for a bottle of sunscreen and sits on his lounger to put it on. He doesn’t even get a chance to open it before Mako asks, “May I?”

Jamie grins and holds out the bottle for Mako to take as he sits down on his own lounger. Mako pours some onto his hands, then reaches up and presses the side of his hand into Jamie’s shoulder to have him lean forward, toward Mako. Jamie rests his chest on his knees, allowing Mako as much space as he wants. He starts with the shoulders, cupping them and getting the majority of the sunscreen on them before he runs what excess will come with him down Jamie’s back.

It’s not the greatest lubricant. It’s kind of sticky, and Jamie’s skin draws with the friction; Mako’s half-tempted to ask if it hurts, but Jamie doesn’t seem to have any complaints. It helps that Mako is a little bit of a novice masseur, knowing how to move with his muscles in a way that doesn’t go against the grain. It gives Mako the chance to really appreciate the complete lack of body fat under Jamie’s skin. He can feel every fibre of his muscle, tightening and relaxing under his hands, and the rigid, solid sensation of the bones underneath.

It really is a masterful, flawless glamour that he puts on every day. It’s doubtful that he really needs sunscreen since his true form is only tangible on another plane, but it would cast some awful suspicion if a pale-skinned blonde spent all day in the sun without going home looking like a well-cooked lobster.

Mako moves up to his neck, letting his fingers sink into Jamie’s skin and muscle and decides to stick around to ease a few spots of tension that he finds, eliciting a pleased purr out of him, and Mako chuckles.

There’s a little bit of a playful, petulant whine as Mako leads Jamie to sit back up. Mako loads his hands back up with sunscreen again and tackles the deep collarbones, down into Jamie’s pectorals, and down his arms. Mako pours out smaller amounts onto his index finger and runs it down Jamie’s nose, then over the shells of his ears. 

To wipe the leftover residue off from his hands, Mako places them on Jamie’s cheeks and smears it on, eliciting a variety of amusing noises and expressions out of him. When he’s done, he squishes Jamie’s cheeks together to force him to make a kissy-face, then leans in and plants a kiss upon them before relinquishing him.

“There. All set.”

“Now it’s your turn!” Jamie exclaims excitedly, snatching the bottle of sunscreen from Mako.

“Come again?”

“For sunscreen! Ya don’t wanna get burned, do ya?”

Mako chuckles. “I’m an Islander, Jamie. I don’t burn, I brown.”

“Oh.” Jamie’s attitude immediately takes a nose-dive. “...I was hopin’ I’d get a chance ta rub ya down too.”

“You can if you want. You can either rub me down now, or get to go home with the toastiest Mako Rutledge the sun can afford to give you.”

“Mmm…” Jamie looks down at the bottle. It’s a tough decision...his temptation to chase immediate gratification is strong, but he’s absolutely dying to see a warmer Mako whose olive complexion has always been on the lighter side.

That _does_ sound good. And if today goes like how he wants it to, he can get to rub Mako’s body _after_ it’s been sun-kissed. He dunks the bottle into the bag and leans backward to lay across his longer, peeking over the edge of the umbrella and pointing up at the sun threateningly as it shines in the rainbow-finish reflection of his sunglasses.

“Don’t fuck me over on this.”

When he sits back up, Mako is holding out a beach ball, still uninflated and in its packaging, towards Jamie.

“You can work on this while you wait for your lotion to absorb in.”

“Oh. Thrilling,” Jamie responds with a flat tone, but takes the package and gets to work anyway.

“I’ll be in the water,” Mako says, standing up. “You and your friend can join me when you’re ready.”

Jamie watches Mako walk away over the edge of latex, expelling the last of a lungful of air into it before lowering it from his mouth.

“Hate to see him leave,” Jamie murmurs to himself, “but _love_ ta see him go.”

The next forty minutes after Jamie and his ball join Mako in the water, they play a scoreless game of bouncing the ball between each other. Mako is exceptionally good at swimming, but Jamie can still swim laps around him, no doubt due to the amount of engineering that went into his new prosthetics. 

_And this is the genius engineer they’re missing out on,_ Mako laments.

It ends when Jamie is summoned by a redhead (Emily, Jamie later introduces, “the only lesbian fast enough to keep up with Tracer”) to barbecue more food for the steadily increasing number of guests. Mako follows, uninterested in being abandoned… and partially intrigued to see why Jamie is the one that everyone wants to handle the cooking.

Mako knew that Jamie knew how to cook from the times that he’d help make things at the condo, but he hadn’t seen _this_ level of passion for it. He’s not so much being voluntold to do it as he is being reminded that everyone’s plates need refills.

He takes a seat next to the barbie and simply watches, content to simply be a fly on the wall while Jamie does his social butterfly thing, listening half-heartedly to conversation while he fixates on Jamie’s abdomen and how the sun gives dramatic shading to his ab muscles.

He doesn’t realise he’s been daydreaming until Jamie sticks a paper plate in front of him, full of the vegetarian meat and sausage they’d brought, plus some grilled fruit and vegetables.

“Thanks,” he murmurs, then digs in. It’s delicious, and goes with whatever homemade sauce Jamie had been preparing a few days ago. 

Later, after everyone’s had their fill and given enough time to digest, most of them head back out to the beach to play games. Mako and Jamie absolutely _demolish_ anyone who challenges them to volleyball, probably due to their combined heights and arm length; both of them can smack a ball from basically any half of the “court” without having to move from where they stand; games only became fair when people demanded that they be on opposite teams, but they don’t mind competing against each other either, complete with showboating and shit-talking.

After a dunk in the ocean to wash their sweat off with equally salty water, Jamie and Mako retire to their recliners in the late afternoon sun. Mako is still working on catching his breath when Jamie turns to the side to face Mako, head propped up in his hand, as he pushes his shades up to sit past his hairline to take in Mako’s appearance.

The sun is doing its blessed work, turning the previously lighter skin a significant few shades darker, reducing the contrast between his skin and the darkest ink of his tattoos.

“Hey, Mako…”

“Mmh?”

“Do ya wanna have sex tonight?”

Mako almost can’t believe his ears. For a second he gives himself a quick reality check to make sure that he’s not dreaming, that Jamie really just point-blank asked him such a blunt yes or no question about something he’s been wanting to do for _months_ now.

Despite feeling his heart beat quicken--which he’d _just_ managed to calm down, damn it--he casually answers:

“I thought you’d never ask.”

Jamie grins.


	8. VIII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all!
> 
> Thank you so much for the overwhelmingly positive response that this fic has gotten! Now that we've reached a certain significant crossroads, some things will be changing. I will be more responsive to fic comments, and I'll be more active about making announcements regarding this fic on my [personal Tumblr.](http://murasakidoku.tumblr.com/) (Most of what I reblog on there is mostly Roadrat content anyway!)
> 
> Thank you everyone for your continued support!! Love and kisses~

Mako feels like an overly excited virgin.

He never really wound down from the moment Jamie asked him about whether or not he wanted to have sex, and he’s been fighting with himself to try to hide it this entire time. At first, he felt foolish; why should it feel like it’s special, when Jamie gives it so freely to practical strangers? It’s not until the cab ride home that it finally dawns on Mako.

It’s _not_ the same thing that Jamie gives out. This is the accumulation of their relationship over time; this is their next step. Jamie has sex with everyone else to sustain his life; Jamie is going to have sex with Mako because he loves him.

_We’re not going to have sex, we’re going to make love._

Mako turns red and scowls at the passing scenery for that sugar-sweet sappy thought while he squeezes Jamie’s hand unconsciously.

“I’m going to go wash up,” Mako says when they get home. “Get this sea water out of my hair for good.”

“Sure!” Jamie says as he plugs in his phone to charge on the bedside table. “I’ll probably do the same.”

Once he’s out of Jamie’s immediate vicinity, Mako feels like he can finally catch his breath. _Ridiculous._ He’s pushing fifty and Jamie makes him feel like he’s brand new to his twenties, he makes him smile until his face hurts, makes him laugh until he chokes. They passed out on the couch together, split a milkshake, shared a joint; all these precious moments that Jamie doesn’t have with any other person. His night crawls never lasted more than three hours, and he always came home, straight back to Mako.

He remembers their first night together. He remembers wanting that immediate payoff, looking for relief: Jamie was a means to an end. But now he’s the adventure in itself.

Mako’s swirling thoughts come to a rolling stop as he dries his hair. He might as well pump the breaks on his boyish excitement, because this whole thing is going to be a lot more fun if he kicks back and lets things develop naturally, just like everything else about their relationship. _Besides…_ Mako grins at himself in the mirror. _I’ve gotta exact some sweet revenge for him making me wait so long._

When Mako comes out of the bathroom, he’s wearing a deep blue jacquard-print velour bathrobe with silver accents. He finds Jamie sitting on the couch, sipping on a bottle of water as he watches television.

“All yours,” he says when Jamie looks up at him.

“Ah, cheers.” Jamie puts his water on the coffee table next to the Christmas tree and hops up. He passes Mako on the way to the bathroom, feeling a little giddy about it himself but not nearly putting as much thought into it as Mako is.

When Jamie closes the bathroom door, Mako lets out a sigh to soothe himself and looks around. He goes over to the bedside table and uses the remote to turn down the light and cast the place in a warm glow, then digs around in the second drawer of the stand.

He suddenly realises that they should’ve made a stop before coming home.

All he has are his plain, self-lubricated _Kimono_ condoms, his water-based jelly (with aloe), and a half-dozen personal massagers and toys. It would seem less “the only action I’ve seen in years is my own hand” if he had a more standard endowment and reflected as such in his condom choice. It’s a dangerous assumption that they’ll fit Jamie. On top of that, the lube really isn’t that exciting or flirty, just functional. The toys are...there if they need them, but Mako just wants this to be just them.

Then again…

With the kind of person Jamie is, he should expect him to be better equipped for this than Mako is. He turns his head over his shoulder and looks at the backpack that is slumped against the side of the sofa, but he decides against digging around in it.

Mako decides to pull out his own tape of condoms and lube anyway, tossing them on the bed. He moves over to the other side of the bed and sits at his computer desk, then pulls open his jewellery drawer and takes out a small lacquered box and delicately places it on his desktop. He tilts the lid open, exposing a colourful selection of jewellery nestled in pillowed rows. 

He rubs his chin as he deliberates on which set he wants to wear. _Special_ , is the word that comes to mind. He has all sorts of colourful and elegant designs to choose from, but what are best for this moment…?

Ultimately, he picks out a set of gunmetal black barbells that have a weaving design that hangs under his nipples like stirrups with bright pinkish-red rubies imbedded between the woven gaps. There’s a matching third piece, a circular barbell of the same gunmetal black and ruby caps, with a thick girth to it; and unlike his nipple piercings, he can’t see where it goes without the help of his mirror.

He spends some time debating whether or not he should put up his hair. In the end, he just decides to put it up in a simple ponytail -- it can evolve as it needs to from there.

Satisfied with his prep, Mako hoists himself up on his bed and reclines up against the mountain of plushies at the head. The television is on, left at a barely audible volume, but Mako doesn’t need the commentary to let the nature documentary take his mind off things.

Jamie doesn’t show up until after the next documentary starts. He’s dressed in the matching half of the pair of velour bath robes they bought--this one red with gold accents. Jamie doesn’t realise Mako insisted on it because it matched his real skin and eyes. He lingers at the corner dividing the living space with the hall that makes up the kitchen and bathroom, leaning upon it and running his arm up it. His hair is still wet, towel-dried at best and then combed and slicked back to keep it tame. He rocks back and forth, just slightly, as the two of them exchange wordless, coy smiles.

He leaves his spot at the corner to approach the sofa. He pulls up his backpack and sits it on the cushions to dig out a cloth and leather carrying case that fits in his hand, about quarter of the size of a school binder and likely designed to carry school supplies.

But Mako isn’t stupid. He’s not about to ask why Jamie is bringing a case of school supplies to bed. Jamie saunters to the side of the bed, crawling up to sit with his full leg tucked under him. He leans in and they kiss, surprisingly tame and tender for what they’re about to get into.

Jamie breaks the kiss with only a few inches and grins, looking into Mako’s hidden eyes the best he can.

“You excited?”

Mako resists the temptation to roll his eyes. Of course Jamie wants to _talk_ during it.

But is that really that bad? This is different. This isn’t just a dalliance. It’s not about appearances, it’s not about performance, it’s not about the end goal -- it’s about the two of them existing together as one. He needs to let go of his reservations and give himself entirely to Jamie.

“Yeah.”

Jamie’s grin grows wider. “Me too.”

Mako successfully resists the temptation to scoff, and when he asks “Why?” he sounds genuinely confused. “It’s not the first time _you’ve_ had sex in years.”

Jamie lets out a light giggle. “Well, yeah…”

He reaches up and draws the back of his fingers down Mako’s chubby, smooth cheek. “...but it’s my first time having sex like _this._ ”

“Like this…?” Mako asks.

“Yeah.”

Mako fears that Jamie’s never going to elaborate, despite his chatty nature, because there’s a silence in the air that lingers as Jamie runs his hand down Mako’s neck and down to his chest, letting his fingertips and palm feel the soft skin, pliant with fat. Mako’s time in the sun has browned him to perfection; it shows most prominently against Jamie’s pale glamour skin, and he admires the way he can feel the warmth of the day’s sun radiate off of him.

Mako lets his hands wander where they want. Jamie’s amputated leg is thicker and softer than his other, and Mako dares to let his fingers wander between the folds of the soft bathrobe, his thumb riding the curve of his rigid beltline. 

“...the first time I’ve had sex with someone I’m in love with,” Jamie whispers.

His fingers have landed on Mako’s chin by then, and he leans in for another slow, tender kiss. There’s no hunger, no carnal energy behind it.

Mako doesn’t know if that’s true or not, but in his heart, he feels that it is.

“I’ll be gentle,” he assures Jamie, smiling. Jamie lets out a light laugh. “But I’m awful cross with you, you know…”

“Hunh?”

Mako smirks. “I’m gonna make you cum for every month you’ve made me wait for this.”

Jamie laughs again, a little more like his usual cackle. “If I knew that was my punishment, I would’ve waited longer!”

“Hope you’ve got a short refractory period, or else we’ll be here all night.”

“I don’t want ta brag, but I’m alright with either case.”

Mako presses his hand up under the robe until he can’t go any further due to the tie around Jamie’s waist. With Mako paying most of his attention to his abs, Jamie closes his eyes and moves his own hand upward, slipping his fingertips into a rather peculiar formation on his skull, and Mako feels a strange sensation that only lasts for a split-second that he could only describe as a magical pull that he can detect only due to his sensitivity to magic.

So _that’s_ what _Lilin_ magic feels like. All that time of casting suspicion on Jamie at first, and this is the first time he’s actually used it. Frankly, Mako doesn’t care. He trusts that whatever it was, it’s something that Jamie needs to do, so he leaves it be and focuses on the feel of Jamie’s fluffy blonde pubes under his fingertips. He gets to the base of his shaft and feels the life in it.

Jamie tilts his amputated leg up, knee in the air to allow whatever access Mako wants, as he leans to the side and rests his body against Mako, resting his head on the top of the huge swell of his belly, like he was snuggling with an overstuffed teddy bear. He uses his flesh arm as an effective pillow, staring at Mako with an enamoured, easy smile while one large hand blindly explores his nethers.

Mako feels flesh become more turgid in his grasp, feels it grow as the soft foreskin get pulled back. He’s content to pet it and take in the sensation of the shifting flesh of another person, but at a certain point, Mako finds himself...surprised. Even in his massive hand, it fills a surprising amount of his grip.

His curiosity gets the best of him. He lets go of Jamie’s cock to take a hold of the edge of the robe and pull it up, hiking it past Jamie’s upright knee to get it out of the way.

“ _Christ._ ” Mako feels self-conscious with how he feels his mouth instantly water at the size of it.

Jamie’s smile turns mischievous. “Is it what ya were hopin’ for…?”

Mako gives Jamie a side-eye that he can’t see. So _that’s_ what he was doing in his brain: digging up the fact that he’s a filthy size queen.

“I’m surprised,” he says, after swallowing a mouthful of saliva. Jamie knows it’s _exactly_ what he was hoping for. “I was expecting...I dunno, rashes or bumps.”

Jamie’s head jolts upright with a gasp of mock-horror. His prosthetic hand comes up and swats Mako on the chest harmlessly. “That’s _mean!_ ”

Mako can’t help himself; he chuckles. “Sorry.”

“No you’re not,” Jamie says, sticking out his tongue.

“I am, kind of. That was...below the belt--mrf!” Mako gets cut off by a prosthetic palm stuffing itself against his face.

“ _Hooley Dooley._ I kinda hate how much I’ve rubbed off on ya,” Jamie chuckles, releasing Mako’s face and pulling his arm in towards himself, comfortably draping it over Mako’s belly and stroking his metal thumb idly against him.

“I mean it, though.” Mako lowers his hand back down, enveloping Jamie’s cock again in a loose hold, gently massaging the steadily stretching foreskin. “It was in bad taste...especially in this context.”

Jamie shrugs noncommittally. “I don’t mind. I thought it was funny, actually. I get tested at least once every two weeks, so I’m not insecure about it.”

Mako’s eyebrows raise. “That must add up quickly.”

“It’s part of my membership fee at _Pleiades._ ” A beat. “...which isn’t cheap, no.”

“You must feel it’s worth it, though…”

“Yeah. You meet people in the same headspace, clear methods of communication and negotiation, it’s all really professional. Way better than trying to pick up strangers at a bar. I’d like to bring you there, sometime...if you’re interested.”

Mako can’t believe that _this_ is what they’re talking about while he gives Jamie the world’s laziest hand job. “I could warm up to the idea, one day,” he admits. If, at least, only for a brief moment to get to know that part of Jamie’s life. Regardless, the positive answer makes Jamie’s eyes light up.

“Speaking of which…”

Jamie reaches his arm across, and even with how lanky he is, he can just barely reach the lube and condoms that Mako’s already set out. He brings it to his face so he can read the printing on the condom foils and then the labelling on the lube. “Oh, I _love_ how much you treat yourself.”

“I don’t see a reason to spare expenses on something like this.” Mako holds out his hand after Jamie inspects the lube to take it from him.

“I knew there was a reason why I fell in love with ya,” he says as he hands the lube to Mako. “Is this all ya got?”

Mako takes his hand off of Jamie’s dick and pours a generous glob of the stuff on his palm, then snaps it shut and puts it aside again. “I have some toys,” he answers honestly as he wraps his hand around Jamie again, this time with a more assertive hold to smear the lube all over his length. “But I’m not in the mood for them tonight.”

“Mm,” Jamie murmurs in agreement. “You can introduce us some other time.” As his dick gets slicker, Mako’s hand gets tighter, his movement faster. “I’ve got all the other essentials we could possibly need,” he adds, closing his eyes and allowing himself to enjoy the ride. His prosthetic hand finds a perch on Mako’s moving wrist, delicately and gingerly tracing his metal fingertips against his dark, tattooed skin. His grip on Mako tightens and he lets out a small gasp, followed by a pleased rumble as he orgasms, spreading a few healthy streams of cum along the length of Mako’s forearm and dribbling down the web of his thumb.

Mako keeps his hand around Jamie, still but tight, as the other shrinks in his grasp.

“For April,” Mako comments quietly.

“ _Jesus,_ you were serious.”

“I don’t make empty threats,” he says with a smirk.

Jamie sighs and sits up. He moves his hand so that he’s holding Mako’s wrist from below, then lifts Mako’s arm up. He doesn’t fight it, even though he doesn’t know what Jamie’s about to do until he meets the cum-soaked web of Mako’s thumb with his tongue, then travels all the way up his forearm until he’s licked all the ejaculate off of him.

Mako’s eyebrows hit the ceiling.

“What?” Jamie asks after swallowing, then makes a lewd smacking noise in his mouth with his tongue. “Gotta conserve my fluids if that’s what you’re plannin’ ta do ta me.”

Mako isn’t sure if he actually thought he’d be able to out-sex a _Lilin_ or if it was just a matter of assuming Jamie would take it without bringing his own artillery. It was more likely the latter, in retrospect.

“This is the night I’m gonna lose my dick,” Mako jokingly laments.

“You know you can seek your own orgasm at any time,” Jamie reassures, shifting up so that he can straddle Mako’s belly; it’s only thanks to how soft it is that his knees, prosthetic and otherwise, actually manage to meet the bed. His robe is heavy enough to close on its own when he got up, returning him to relative decency even if Mako can feel his genitals through the fabric of his own robe. “It’s not like that was part of the challenge.”

“I still don’t know how much of my stamina I’ve retained,” Mako admits.

Jamie gives him a one-shouldered shrug as he picks up his carrying case and unzips it open. “Worse comes to worse, we can have a part two tomorrow. Don’t push yourself, mate, just focus on having fun.” He opens the case like a book and holds it out for Mako to peruse.

One half of the case is just a large net pocket with an elastic to keep it closed. It’s full of individually packaged items like condoms, dental dams, and nitrile gloves, with so many different flavours, textures, and sizes that the pouch is practically bursting. The other half is a series of elastics that have been sewn into straps to hold in a variety of different lubes, with a selection that rivals that of the barriers.

“Anything tickle your fancy?”

“Variety is the spice of life, huh?” Mako asks, looking through it before deciding that he can’t really see it that well. He holds up his hand. “May I?” Jamie nods and hands it over for Mako to start digging through it. 

“What are your favourite flavours?” Mako asks, once he starts feeling like there’s too much to keep mental inventory of.

“It depends on what we’re talking about, buuuuut -- chocolate, mint...mmm, blueberry? I don’t keep any flavours that I hate, so you can’t really go wrong.”

“Passion fruit?”

Jamie laughs. “I’d only recommend it for people who like it tart.”

“Hm.”

There’s a long pause as several ideas fill Mako’s mind, but he struggles to figure out which one he wants to do next. All those fantasies he’s had about Jamie, alone on his bed, or in the shower...and now he has the chance to do them in real life.

“Which one of these rubbers fit you best?”

“Anything labelled large or more,” Jamie answers without hesitation, then glances down at Mako’s set. “Yours would work too.”

_God,_ he’s waited his whole life to hear something like that. Mako pulls out the passion fruit lube and closes the case, holding it between his teeth while he uses a free hand to separate a condom from the rest of the pack. He puts them both aside for now, and Jamie puts the case out of the way.

Mako takes the edges of Jamie’s bathrobe and moves them out of the way just enough to reveal just his flaccid member, half-tucked into its foreskin, and his sack. Mako starts playing with his cock with his fingers and thumb again, all while Jamie lets his eyes fall half-lidded and raises his arms up over his head to throw out his chest tantalisingly--

_Cr-crk._

“Jamie?” Mako asks with alarm as Jamie’s posture suddenly goes limp as he lightly laughs. “You okay?”

“Oh yeah,” he chuckles, resuming his posing. “I needed that. I’m all off-kilter from everything we did today.”

Mako gives him a relieved smile. “Well, that’s good. I was starting to feel self-conscious for just sitting here.”

“Just sittin’ there nothin’! You’re the one doin’ all the work, mate.”

Now Mako is the one chuckling. “Only because I’ve been aching to touch you like this for ages.” As if in time with Mako’s statement, Jamie starts growing in his grip again. “Already back in action,” Mako comments.

Jamie shrugs. “I like hearin’ that I’m wanted.”

“You are…” Mako starts giving him a few twisting pulls to get him fully at attention. “... _always_ wanted. I look forward to every school holiday so that I can be by your side again.”

“Awh...you’re gonna make me feel all sticky-sweet,” Jamie says, as Mako tears open the condom packet and pulls it out.

“That’ll make two of us,” he responds, rolling it down Jamie’s length. He then pulls up the bottle of passion fruit lube and pours the slightly more viscous lube (at least, in comparison to the jelly he used earlier) down the barrier, then pinches the reservoir. Mako plants his elbows beside him, then pushes himself down the bed a little, so that he isn’t so upwardly reclined against the stuffies. Using the pillows to find a more comfortable position, he settles in and gives Jamie, who has just been enjoying the ride, a wriggling _come hither_ finger.

Jamie immediately obeys, moving forward and shifting his weight onto his knees. Mako has to stop himself from laughing at the way that Jamie’s cock is so fat and heavy that it can’t stand up at all despite being hard as a rock. With the back of his finger against the underside of Jamie’s glans, he leads it to his mouth and sucks him down as Jamie cautiously inches forward but stops when he feels the back of Mako’s mouth.

Mako tilts his head back a little more to straighten out the bend his throat makes and takes Jamie by the hips to goad him forward. Jamie has no choice but to trust that Mako is comfortable with what he’s doing and allows himself to be guided further. The sweet, citrusy tart flavour of the lube makes it easy to swallow Jamie without a complaint from his gag reflex, in spite of his size.

“Fffuck,” Jamie hisses. “Never expected the bloke that eats like a princess ta suck down a knob like this…”

Mako would chuckle if his vocal chords weren’t being so obedient, but Jamie feels the twitch of Mako’s fat lips against his pubis in a reflexive attempt to smile.

Speaking of his fat lips, every inch of Mako’s mouth and throat were sending ecstasy through Jamie’s spine. He’s been deepthroated before, but it wasn’t always his favourite -- rigid throats and sharp teeth and unrelenting palates, poking and prodding tongues. But Mako has a soft mouth, a masterful tongue, puffy cheeks that massage his sides when he sucks; it’s easy to fall into the shallow thrusting pattern that Mako suggests with the grip on his hips. He’s able to keep his mouth open wide enough to keep a healthy clearance between Jamie’s cock and his teeth. When Mako pulls him back so that he can either catch his breath or load up on more flavoured lube, Jamie needs the breather just as much and to let his eyes fall back into place from being rolled into the back of his head.

Mako feels small like this, with his head surrounded by all of Jamie: his cock taking up all of his mouth and throat, his thighs on either side of his head, Jamie’s heaving, panting upper body hovering above him. There’s nothing about this experience that isn’t completely delectable. 

The only time Jamie doesn’t obey the pattern Mako commands out of his hips is when his orgasm comes at an unexpected time for both of them. Mako holds on the best he can even though his lungs are screaming for air, reminding himself that it won’t last forever.

Jamie pulls himself free when he’s done, stepping aside so that he can flop down on the bed, aligning himself with Mako’s side and using his upper arm as a pillow as they both pant to get their air back.

“Mako,” Jamie says, once he’s able to get it out.

“Yeah?”

“I sleep around a lot...not really a surprise, I know...but even with that in mind, that was the best deepthroat I’ve ever had.”

“Good to know.”

Jamie sits up and slides the spent condom off of his flaccid cock. He struggles with the slipperiness of it but eventually manages to get a knot in the end of it before tossing it into the bin next to Mako’s desk. “If I didn’t already have an oral fixation, I would now.”

Mako smirks to himself, pushing himself down so that he’s properly laying on his back, then folds his hands over his chest. “May,” he murmurs, closing his eyes.

Jamie huffs out a laugh as he fetches his case again, fishing around in it out of Mako’s view. 

After a few minutes of shuffling around, Jamie finally speaks up. “Gotta keep that mouth busy,” he finally says, and before Mako can ask for him to elaborate, his mouth is blocked by something heavy through the texture of thin latex.

Mako opens his eyes in surprise and is gifted a view of Jamie’s mouth-wateringly well-built backside, all the soft and supple muscle of his juicy ass, the upright parallel muscles of his lower back, and the hardened triangular shapes of his shoulders, an intangible tail swishing with excited delight.

“Come on,” Jamie murmurs with a sexy grin, craning his neck over his shoulder to look down at Mako. “I know you must be hungry; there wasn’t any dessert at the party.”

So he just invited himself to queening on Mako’s face? It’s a hell of a power move to just do it without asking, _assuming_ that Mako would be okay with it by default. He’s starting to get the impression that Jamie dug up more than just his size preference from his brain-magic…or it could just be a coincidence and Jamie’s always this assertive in bed.

Mako takes Jamie by the thighs and digs in, because Jamie is absolutely correct. The dental dam allows him to go at it without hesitation; Jamie was kind enough to prep it with chocolate and strawberry lube (apparently committed to the whole “dessert” bit) and it really does tantalize his appetite enough to have him kissing and sucking on Jamie’s rim, even going as far as far as sticking his tongue inside and fighting against Jamie’s instinctive muscle twitches, relishing the moments where Jamie bounces on his heels to add more weight to Mako’s face; his cute, spherical sack occasionally bumping into the pad of fat under his jaw.

Meanwhile, Jamie snakes his fingers under the neckline of Mako’s robe, seeking out his nipples to play with. Once his fingers find them, he lets out a surprised gasp as he feels different, bigger jewellery. He looks over his shoulder with a wide grin.

“ _Special occasion,_ huh?” All according to plan. Mako can’t respond in the affirmative, so he does the next best thing by lathing a long, slow, broad-tongued lick across Jamie’s hole, causing him to shiver.

Jamie pushes the neckline of Mako’s robe open to reveal his breasts and new jewellery. Jamie croons, gathering handfuls of Mako’s tits from the outside and pulling their mass inward to make the closest approximation to cleavage, which is honestly pretty successful.

“They’re so _pretty,_ ” Jamie comments, flicking the half-shields with his thumbs, tweaking and twisting his nipples by proxy. “I love ‘em!”

Jamie lets go of his chest when his next erection hits. “Alright, Mako, I gotta be honest,” he says, lifting his ass from Mako’s face--even when Mako tries to keep chasing it, eventually finding that he’s not flexible enough to keep his mouth glued to Jamie’s butt. “I have _got_ to get your dick inside of me.”

Jamie’s too hungry to let this one-sided game keep going. Mako’s skilled enough to just make him hungrier, and he’s going to need to feed if Mako really plans to keep up this delightful “punishment game.” Plus, the longer he makes Mako wait, the more Mako’s libido builds, and the tiny condo is so full of sexual energy that there’s a pretty significant ache inside Jamie to let old habits take over, and he certainly doesn’t want that.

“You got it,” Mako says in the affirmative. Jamie finishes crawling off of him and hurriedly rushes to take off his robe entirely, and Mako sits up to do the same. By the time he’s done, he looks over at Jamie to find him taking off his prosthetics.

“You don’t have to do that,” Mako says.

“No, it’s…” Jamie gives him a sheepish smile. “...better if I do. Trust me.”

Mako shrugs. “Whatever’s best for you,” he responds, “I’m cool with it.”

In the meantime, Mako preps himself with a condom and lube. By the time he’s done, Jamie has laid himself out, ass-up, on the bed, watching Mako expectantly with his prosthetics neatly laid out on his other side. Mako grabs his aloe lube, then turns over to get onto his knees to straddle Jamie’s thighs. He runs a gentle, loving hand down Jamie’s back and spreads his ass cheek to the side so that he can squeeze a large glob of jelly lube onto Jamie’s hole.

Mako leans forward, blindly taking hold of his own cock from under his large gut, and he has to navigate through touch alone to aim it at Jamie’s entrance, adding pressure to it until he finally breaches. Jamie lets out a pleasurable gasp and moans the entire time it takes for Mako to sink from head to hilt, adding more and more of the weight of his belly to Jamie’s lower back until--

_Pop!_

He can feel Jamie’s pelvis minutely shift under the pressure. Mako sighs. “We need to get you to a chiropractor.”

Jamie just giggles. “Why would I need a chiropractor when I’ve got you?”

Mako just shakes his head and starts a series of slow, rolling semi-deep thrusts, all of which Jamie delights in. He was relatively quiet for the last few rounds, but something about this makes him a bit more vocal. Mako braces himself over Jamie as his pleasure drives him to faster speeds; his hand covers the back of Jamie’s only remaining one and they interlace their fingers as best as possible. Is it just Mako’s imagination, or is there some kind of arcing static electricity between their limbs…? He can’t _feel_ anything and they’re gone as soon as they appear, making them feel like phantoms in his peripherals. He doesn’t let it distract him too much; he’s finding it harder to breathe but he finds himself compelled to go faster, go harder; squeeze those mewls and moans from Jamie with relentless brushes against his prostate.

He only gets a good look at them when he’s too deep in to care. Red and pink bolts dance across their skin from one to the other, connecting the two of them in a way beyond the physical realm. The power starts to flicker; or is that just his imagination? He doesn’t give it much thought as he loops his arm around Jamie’s. With their elbows linked, Mako presses his forearm against Jamie’s back while he grasps Jamie’s arm stump with his hand. He pulls Jamie up a bit, adding a pleasurable upward stretch to Jamie’s spine. The groans and grunts are loud enough for the neighbours to hear, but they’re probably more preoccupied with the rapidly increasing flicker of the lights. Mako has more important things to keep his mind on than the static electricity now coming off the two of them and licking the walls and ceiling of his condo.

Mako howls with an orgasm strong enough to make him white out. On the edges of his conscious thought, he feels and hears Jamie come at the same exact time.

The power has gone out.

Jamie collapses to the bed when Mako lets go of him, the two of them panting wildly.

There are tiny little zaps between their bodies. He can feel them this time; they’re like static electricity, and he can feel it build in the strands of his hair. Jamie can feel them too--whenever they zap each other with a new touch, he lets out a pleasured whimper.

So _this_ is what it’s like to have sex with a _Lilin._

“June,” Mako eventually manages, adding a breathy chuckle at the end. He leans in to nuzzle the back of Jamie’s head, but his glasses and forehead clunk against something hard and chitinous in the dark. He reaches out to touch it, feeling the ribbed texture of it, and realises it’s moving with Jamie’s breathing.

_His horns,_ Mako thinks. His gut sinks.

His worries are confirmed when Jamie opens his eyes, casting a warm, candle-like glow into the room. Mako’s eyes adjust to the low light, and he turns to the mirror to confirm his suspicions.

Pinned underneath him is bright red skin. A thin tail with a knife blade on the end, two familiar notches in it. The demon underneath him has gone quiet, and Mako suspects that he’s starting to realise that something is amiss.

“Hey,” Mako says, using a calm, gentle tone as he gets off of Jamie and frees him. “Don’t panic, but I think something happened…”

Jamie crawls out from under Mako and turns around to sit up.

“It’s okay--” Mako starts.

Jamie holds up his own clawed hand to look at it and immediately startles, backing up into the wall of stuffed animals behind them and sending most of them scattering down to the bed and floor.

“--I’m not scared,” Mako says, placatively holding out his hands as Jamie’s heel digs into the bed, fruitlessly trying to get himself further away from the situation. “You don’t need to be worried, I’m not scared,” he repeats. “I always knew.”

But they don’t seem to be the right words. Jamie is looking at him like _he’s_ the monster, and he feels a cold, horrible, constricting feeling in his chest. His eyes carry the terror of prey, not the ones of a lover caught in a lie.

Mako reaches out to him. “Jamie--”

With a scatter of yet more stuffed animals, Jamie bolts away from Mako and makes a lopsided beeline for the balcony door. Mako doesn’t know how he’s able to move so quickly missing half his limbs, or how he’s able to yank the door open, but this isn’t leading anywhere Mako likes.

“Jamie!”

He lurches off the bed to try to stop Jamie from whatever he’s trying to do, but the demon is far more limber than he is, and by the time he gets to the door, Jamie is already gone. Did he...jump?

Mako runs into the rail and practically bends over it to try to spot him. He _has_ jumped, and what relief comes from seeing that Jamie has materialised bat-like wings is quickly snuffed out when he realises that he’s flying away as quickly as possible.

“ _JAMIE!_ ” Mako calls out, and at the top of his already overworked lungs, his deep voice cracks, and it gets sucked up into the cold night sky of Melbourne, falling upon countless ears but none of the ones that matter.

The _Lilin_ doesn’t even look back.

Mako falls to his knees.

Behind him, the power flickers back on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel for supporting me this month!


	9. IX

It’s the same morning he’s had for the last sixteen years. Mako Rutledge wakes up to his lonely presence in his studio apartment, surrounded by scattered stuffed animals and mascots. For a few blissful months, he thought he had finally found someone to share them with.

It’s alright, he tells himself.

Jamie has some pretty extreme reactions to things. He has anxiety and a panic disorder. With how much effort he puts into living his life like a normal human being, it must be jarring to have your darkest secret thrust in front of your partner...at least from Jamie’s perspective. He’ll be back, Mako tells himself. He just needs some time to himself and realize that Mako will always love him, regardless of his supposed secrets.

He can’t believe he woke up, though more surprised that he’d managed to fall asleep in the first place, despite his ceaseless worrying. He’s clinging to the red bathrobe, naked, and his lungs ache like someone had come by during the night and tried to strangle him within an inch of his life. Mako looks up at his nightstand and the undisturbed CPAP machine on it. Jamie’s phone lies next to it.

Reluctantly, Mako pushes himself up and off the bed. It’s freezing in here, and it doesn’t help that he’d left the porch door open in a futile hope that Jamie would come back home after his panic attack passed. It’s pouring like mad outside, bringing chilly gusts of wind with it, and despite being eight in the morning, the clouds are so thick and dark that it looks like it’s eight at night. Mako pushes the door closed.

He considers calling out for work today, but decides against it. He feels like shit, but maybe having something to work on would provide a distraction. Since the television is still on, he switches it to the news and turns up the volume to try to ward off how empty this place is while he gets ready.

_...cold front is bringing record low temperatures to Melbourne today…_

That explains it, he guesses. 

Mako only puts his hair in a low-hanging ponytail, a plain black button-up and dark jeans, no jewelry. He makes himself a smoothie for breakfast, because for as hungry as he is, he can’t make himself sit down for a meal.

He takes the metro instead of his bike. It’s full of people in the post-Christmas rush. Kids scream and cry, bumping into him with their complete lack of understanding of the personal space of strangers.

No one tries to start conversation with him, thankfully. He doesn’t think he could manage a word out to a stranger today, at least nothing more than a single syllable. His conversations with Zarya are short and sweet.

He goes home after work, even if it’s the last place he wants to be right now, surrounded by the essence of Jamie but unable to touch him. He figures that he may as well clean the place up, to give him something to do.

Since the stuffed animals are already displaced, he removes the last few, moves Jamie’s prosthetics to his desk, replaces Jamie’s case in his backpack, and takes the bedsheets off to change them. 

As he works on re-stacking his stuffies at the head of the bed, he comes across a dark pink variant of Pachimari. Her stitched-on gleeful expression remains, despite the current situation; usually her visage was enough to ward the grey clouds and cheer him up. But right now, it’s not working. He wants to yell at her and make her understand that her adamantine smile isn’t enough to fix his troubles this time; it just reminds Mako of Jamie’s.

A loud clap of thunder echoes through the city, illuminating the darkness for a split second.

Instead of having a tantrum, he puts her back in her rightful place on the top of the plushie pile, then puts in a load of laundry.

He works on the kitchen. Then he works on the bathroom. Then the living room. He wishes his condo was bigger, because it means that he probably wouldn’t have made the whole place immaculate and finished his laundry in less than three hours.

Mako sits on his couch listlessly, like he’s waiting for something to happen. He stares at their Christmas tree, then leans over to turn on the lights, as if it were a beacon calling Jamie home.

He gets up and opens the balcony door just a crack, giving it enough space that Jamie would be able to slip his fingers in and get inside when he gets back.

The morning sees no Jamie in his bedroom.

Zarya is at work before Mako is, on a day equally as rainy as the last. When he shows up, she first starts to smile to greet him as usual, but it immediately disappears when she reads his body language. Today, he now _looks_ as shitty as he feels.

“Rutle...Mako?” she asks, reaching out to put an hand on his forearm as he sits at his workstation. “Are you okay?”

There’s really no point in lying, right? Mako types in his password, and a few seconds pass before he looks over at her. “No,” he replies. “But I’ll live.”

“What happened?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

How would he? _My boyfriend ran away after we had sex and realized I knew he was a demon._ It’s simple in concept, but there’s a whole can of worms here that he doesn’t want to get into, even if she did believe him. If she didn’t, he’d just sound like he’d lost his sanity.

“That’s okay,” she reassures. “Do you want to do inventory today? You would not have to talk to anyone.”

Mako sighs. Even though he’s the boss, and therefore the one who designates responsibility, he can’t argue with her logic.

“Yeah. Sounds good.”

Sure enough, the bin is mostly full when Mako checks it. For all the activity that dropped their books off on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, the day after is awfully quiet. He doesn’t mind it; it means that he can set to stacking the shelves without having random people asking him for help. On top of that, no one is bothered by the occasional vibrating of a phone that isn’t his in his pocket.

He pocketed it and brought it with him with the idea that Jamie might use his own number to reach out to Mako, because he’s more likely to remember his own number than Mako’s. Provided, of course, that he remembers that he left the phone with Mako in the first place.

Zarya offers to give him lunch and company. She knows he’s in a rotten mood, so he trusts her to not try to make idle conversation. She doesn’t disappoint.

At some point in the afternoon, when Mako is in the bathroom, he decides to check Jamie’s phone. There are lots of notifications from apps, games, and text messages -- no missed calls or voicemails. Most of the text messages are from friends, names he recognizes, and while he can’t read their entirety, none of them seem bothered by the fact Jamie hasn’t gotten back to them.

The phone buzzes as he’s swiping to clear the notifications. It’s a text from Zarya.

**Заря**

_3:26_

Hey, did something happen between you and Mako yesterd…

He can only read the first part of the message without unlocking Jamie’s phone. He knows _how_ to unlock it, but he’s actively decided not to, since Jamie deserves his privacy even if he’s run away. He could potentially deflect some of Zarya’s curiosity by responding, but he’s not very comfortable with speaking on Jamie’s behalf.

That resolve, however, doesn’t last the night.

Mako tries desperately to get his mind off of everything by distracting himself with design work. He doesn’t work on any specific projects as much as he does trying to funnel his emotions into something tangible, resulting in some bizarre and useless abstract CAD designs.

It may have been easier to accomplish if he hadn’t left Jamie’s prostheses on his desk.

Mako draws to a stillness, staring blankly at his tablet screen with his stylus in hand. He may be able to vent like this, but it feels vacant and unenjoyable.

Ever since that fateful April day, Jamie and Mako have been in constant contact with each other. Jamie would spend his school holidays and the occasional weekend at Mako’s place, and he’d visit the library frequently to use it as a study spot...and even on days where they didn’t physically see each other, they would text, talk about what happened to them as they day went on, sharing cute pictures and videos with each other when there wasn’t anything to say.

For it all to come to an end, with no warning…

The _look_ on Jamie’s face… 

Mako puts down his tablet pen. He reaches out to the limp prosthesis hand on his desk, and he runs his fingertips over the tops of the jointed fingers. They don’t quite respond like someone’s relaxed hand, but he’s not really expecting them to, either. He slips his hand between the machine and the desk, scooping the cold, metal appendage into his hand and closing around it like they held hands countless times before.

But it doesn’t squeeze his hand in return. Outside, the rain patters so thickly and rapidly against his windows that it’s hard to hear anything else.

Despite being a part of Jamie, its presence fills no part of the hole suddenly ripped into Mako’s life. His eyes feel hot and wet, and his vision starts to get blotted out as the terrified expression that Jamie gave him keeps coming back to him.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I don’t know what I did, but I’m sorry for doing it.”

The tears are agonizingly searing on his cheeks. He can’t even work on trying to make things right; he wasn’t given the option to. He has no choice but to sit here, stewing in his emotional agony and re-running those last few minutes together in his head on repeat, wondering what he did wrong. If he could turn back time and prevent the two of them having sex and causing this to happen, he absolutely would do it. _God,_ he wishes the rain would shut up for at least five minutes.

Whatever amount of time passes is punctuated by a chime and a vibration at the corner of Mako’s desk. He lets go of the prosthesis and takes his glasses off, leaving them upside-down on his desk, so that he can reach up and wipe the water from his eyes. He blinks a few times to clear his vision before picking up Jamie’s phone and seeing what the notification was for.

Low battery.

Mako stands up and walks to the other side of the bed so that he can plug it in. Once he pushes the connector into the bottom of the phone, the notification disappears. Behind the three-by-three grid of dots to unlock the phone, he sees the darkened picture of himself and Jamie framed by the colorful graffiti on Rutledge Lane. Jamie’s human visage is white-lipped with foam and Mako is caught halfway between a smile and the realization that Jamie is intentionally making a silly selfie.

Without a conscious thought to make him stop, he automatically draws the pattern he’s seen Jamie use countless times before. The grid and the pattern falls away, and the background picture lights up with its proper colors. The bottom half of the picture is covered by a large-size calendar widget, full of the organized chaos of notes that keeps Jamie on track. On the bottom, the messenger app has a bubble that indicates 28 unread text messages.

The logical part of Mako asks what he plans to do now that he’s here. The emotional side of him flips through the different screens, hoping something might come up that would indicate where Jamie went, or at least find something to fill a little bit of the hole in his heart.

He taps on the photo album.

The first picture he sees is from the Christmas party two days ago. It’s a picture of himself and Mei, who he’d managed to win over by the end of the day; she’s holding a mixed drink courtesy of Tracer (who Mako came to learn is _very_ talented at bartending flair and maybe ordered more than he intended to just to watch her do her thing) and her other hand is busy smacking Mako’s forearm, caught open-mouthed, mid-laugh in the picture. Mako has a smirk on his face, either telling a joke or a funny story; if he remembers correctly, he was regaling her with some stories about the weird patrons he’s had at the library.

As he swipes to the side to find the next picture, he crawls into bed to get comfortable while he goes through the reel.

The second picture is of him, standing at the bar and watching Tracer mix a drink for him. Tracer’s arm and the mix cup are lost in a blur, and Mako is captivated.

The next couple pictures are of the other people at the party. Mako had caught him taking pictures before, but he’d never really given it much thought. Jamie isn’t much of a photographer, as his lighting and composition is far from professional, but he has a knack for capturing candids.

The picture from before the party is of their Christmas tree, after it’s been made up with all of its decorations.

Before that, it’s mostly pictures from school. Pictures from lab, from lecture, of his own notes or other peoples’ notes. Some pictures look like they were taken by accident, blurry pictures at weird angles with no particular subject. Every so often, he runs across a picture of himself, sneaky candids that Jamie took by taking advantage the blind spot that Mako’s glasses make, or from behind. Wearing nothing but underwear in the middle of cooking, running a brush through his hair as he sits in front of his mirror, in the middle of using exercise equipment in the gym downstairs.

There are only two other people that Jamie photographs as much as Mako, and those pictures usually appear in clusters whenever they show up. One of them is a dark-skinned, shorter man with a healthy athletic build, wearing his hair in neat, thick dreadlocks, with an obvious penchant for the color green. He has a sweetheart smile and a stylized frog tattoo on his shoulder, and Jamie towers over him by at least a full foot. Somehow, he seems familiar, but Mako can’t put his finger on it.

Mako doesn’t feel a pang of jealousy, because he would absolutely rail this guy on looks alone if given the chance.

The other person is even smaller, a Korean girl with long brunette hair. She’s about as much a selfie-junkie as Jamie is, always with a pose to match his. Her candids are usual of her playing video games or on her phone; her energy in every picture comes off as a spitfire you wouldn’t want to cross. She doesn’t seem as familiar as the other one, but Mako decides that...well, Jamie and he have very similar tastes in people.

Even if he’d given himself a chance to feel jealousy, it would be immediately squashed by a picture Jamie took of a page in his notebook. There are drawings of chemical compounds all over the page, but front and center is undeniably a cartoony rendering of Mako and Jamie. Mako’s figure is full of ovals and long, swishing lines, and Jamie’s all triangles and straight edges. They’re holding hands, surrounded by clouds of hearts.

This is the picture Mako stops on.

He’d never seen Jamie’s drawings before, which is a shock in retrospect now because he has an amazing artistic eye, someone who has clearly spent a lot of time honing his craft. While not a realistic drawing at all, there’s a flair and style that speaks volumes of how Jamie sees himself as a regular, lanky, disabled human being; how he sees Mako full of elegance and soft edges despite his large and heavyset figure; how the two of them together contrast and complement.

He blinks when his vision goes blurry again. His tears aren’t as hot as the last ones, fat and heavy as they roll down his round cheeks and his neck, soaking into the neckline of his ribbed tank. The sorrow and emptiness is still there, but it’s soothed by being able to see how Jamie views the both of them together. It makes him feel like Jamie’s terror wasn’t because of something Mako actively did, that it was something more like the fact that he didn’t want his boyfriend to find out the identity he tried so hard to hide.

Mako’s thoughts are interrupted when the screen turns blue and a cheerful jingle starts playing. A circle-shaped icon of a sugar skull intricately decorated with different hues of purples and laying on a bed of black velvet bounces over the display name “Sombra”.

Only now does he realize that maybe he shouldn’t have been going through Jamie’s phone. That he was invading his boyfriend’s privacy in a moment of weakness. He takes his hand off of his mouth to slide a finger down on the phone icon to let it go to voicemail, and the picture of his drawing comes up again. It’s hard to feel guilty, even though he knows he should, when he’s found this precious piece hiding away in here--

The screen goes blue again. “Sombra’s” sugar skull bounces at him, once again pulling him out of his small nest of respite in the sea of his aching loneliness. Mako frowns and declines the call again, deciding that he really should be spending his time more productively, and presses the power button until a box comes up that says “Shutting Down…”

Once the screen goes black, Mako puts the phone off to the side and gets up to make dinner. By the time he gets to the kitchen, puts a pan on the stovetop and turns it on, a familiar jingle starts playing for the third time.

Mako’s head whips around and he looks over at the bed. Sure enough, it’s casting blue light against his wall of plushies.

_I turned that damn thing off._

Mako storms back over to the bedside table. Sure enough, it’s turned itself back on, and “Sombra” is trying to call Jamie for the third time in a row. As bizarre as it is that the phone turned itself back on, whatever “Sombra” wants to talk about is important or urgent enough to not be dissuaded by being repeatedly forwarded to voicemail.

Mako sighs and shakes the frustration off of himself. He holds the phone up and slides the phone icon upward to take the call, then puts it up to his ear.

“Hey, Jamie can’t come to the pho--”

“ _Buenas tardes,_ Mako Rutledge,” a feminine, Mexican-accented voice interrupts.

Time stops.

Mako is stunned into silence. How does he respond to that? He pulls the phone down to look at the screen. White and purple sugar skull, Sombra, call options. Does he remember that name somewhere? Did he meet a Sombra at the beach party? It doesn’t sound familiar at all.

He puts the phone back up to his ear again.

“...Who is this?”

“Haven’t you checked the caller ID? My name is Sombra.” Her tone is light and teasing, as if she literally watched him check the ID.

Mako lets out another sigh and pinches the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger.

“I am a friend of Jamie’s,” she continues. “And I know that he’s gone.”

There are plenty of valid questions that Mako could ask her, like how she knows his name but he doesn’t know her, or how she managed to get a call through on a phone that was in the process turning off. None of them are more important than the one that springs to his mind at that moment:

“Do you know where he went?”

“Yeah _._ But it isn’t a place that either of us can get to.”

Figures. There’s probably a lot of places that could fit that description. But that means…

“So you know his secret, then.”

“Of course. But I know the secrets of several people; he isn’t the only one.”

There’s something about that statement that makes a paranoid shiver run down his spine.

“This call isn’t about him, though. It’s about _you.”_

“Me? What about me?”

“ _Your_ secrets... _and_ your questions. It’s time for someone to sit you down and tell you the truth, so that Jamison doesn’t come to harm when he returns to your side.”

This is too unreal. This feels too much like a scripted movie. Yet he can’t stop himself from playing ball.

“How can I trust you’re telling me the truth?”

“You don’t have to,” she responds easily. “Whether or not you believe me is your decision, as it is for all things from this point forward. All I ask is that you listen. Now--do you know how to get to _Pleiades?_ ”

“The club Jamie goes to?” He can’t believe he’s entertaining this. Maybe it’s just because it’s something to do other than sitting around moping. “Yeah. I’ve been by it before.”

“Excellent. Go to the VIP section and tell the doorman that Sombra is expecting you. Don’t take too long; I’m a busy woman.”

The line clicks as it ends. Mako brings the phone back down and looks at it; it’s changed back to the default screen; the unread messages bubble is gone, and all the other apps have closed, including the photo album viewer.

Mako flinches in realization as if he’d touched a hot stove, and the phone drops to the bed. The phone _had_ successfully turned itself off, just to turn back on.

 _Maybe she’s a demon too,_ he thinks to himself. _But if she’s a friend of Jamie’s, I should be able to trust her._ He hopes.

He picks up his glasses from their place on his desk, runs the lenses under the sink to wash them of the dried tears. He clears them up with the kitchen towel, dries them off with the lower edge of his tank, then puts on a nice button-up.

He remembers to turn off the stove before he leaves.

The rain has calmed down to a drizzle by the time Mako leaves the entrance of the condo complex. _Pleiades_ is a reasonable walk from here--and from what he remembers, has no parking whatsoever--so he opens his umbrella and hoofs it.

The first floor is less bustling than he had imagined it to be, having only seen it from the street before, witnessing the crowds gathered in front of it. He closes the umbrella and tamps off some of the water, then hangs it up at the entrance when he gets inside. The place certainly isn’t _dead,_ because there are people milling about, mostly at the bar and groups of friends seated at a table near the bar. He walks to the back, where there’s a doorframe leading directly to stairs, cordoned off with a velveteen rope and a brightly-lit VIP sign above it all on the wall. An androgynous person stands at the side, dressed in a suit; they hold out a hand, as if expecting something from Mako.

“Uh,” he stammers. “Sombra is waiting for me.”

Their eyebrows raise. “Mr. Rutledge?” they ask, their voice just as ambiguous as their appearance.

“Yes, that’s me.”

They reach into their pocket and pull out a roll of admission bracelets. Mako holds out a hand to be fitted with one, and the doorman holds out the bracelet to put it on him, then hesitates. After a moment of deliberation, they reach for a second bracelet and stick them together to make an extra-large bracelet, _then_ puts it around Mako’s wrist.

Mako murmurs an awkward “thanks” as they reach out to the opposite end of the rope and unsecure it, pulling it back to allow Mako entrance.

The air of the second floor is radically different than below. While the first one is trendy and modern, this floor is classy and sultry. More importantly, it’s almost empty, with the exception of a classically vested bartender and a lone woman at a small, round table. When Mako looks at her, she looks up from her phone and gives him a mischievous smile, locking the device with a click that echoes through the room, and placing it face-down on the table.

Mako approaches. She has an undercut, the pattern of a circuit board shaved into one side of her head, while the other half is a long, ombre gradient from her natural hair color down to a vibrant purple. She wears an equally purple silk-like dress with a deeply plunged, draped neckline. A slit in the side of her dress goes high enough to make it seem like she’s not wearing underwear. Her shoes are strappy, open-toed high heels and bright teal in color. Despite his mood, he finds himself allowing his eyes to trail the contours of her petite body.

Tan-skinned and human. Not a trace of demon heritage at all. Mako doesn’t know if this comes as a relief or not.

“Lovely weather we’re having tonight,” she says. Mako scoffs.

He takes a hold of the back of the chair across the table from her and pulls it out, startling slightly at the fact that a black cat has curled up on it. She lets out a mewl, jumping from the chair seat and onto the table before turning to sit next to a pitcher full of bright red, fruit-infused sangria. She looks directly at Mako.

“...Moira?” he asks, half-skeptical, once he sees her eyes and the greying around her muzzle.

“You’ve made her acquaintance?” Sombra asks, an amused smile on her face.

“Yeah,” he answers. He sits in the chair now that it’s vacated. “Jamie...introduced us.”

The tip of Moira’s tail flicks.

“Did you adopt her?” Mako asks.

“ _Adopt?_ _Claro que no,_ she is her own woman.” As if to directly contradict her statement, Sombra taps her long acrylic nails against the surface of the table, and Moira stands up and turns away to drop down to Sombra’s lap. She gently scratches her nails into the top and back of Moira’s head. “She stays at the shelter to protect it from angels and demons.”

Protect it from _what?_

Mako is silent as Sombra reaches for the pitcher of sangria and pours it into the empty wine glass on his side of the table. She puts the pitcher back down when it’s full, and Mako reaches out to take the glass and sip from it.

“I know you have many questions, Mako. Feel free to ask me anything.”

Mako puts his glass down. “Alright. Let’s start at the beginning. Who are you, and what’s your relationship with Jamie?”

“I am Sombra, the Witch of Technology,” she says candidly. “I have been a long time friend of Jamie since the beginning of his exile, as well as your mother, Nikora Rutledge, Witch of the Oceans--may she never lose her way in the depths of Inferno.”

One question’s answer bears the birth of countless others. This is going to be a _long_ conversation. Mako takes a long sip of sangria. So much for questioning whether or not he can believe her--after all…

It’s been at least thirty years since he last heard his mother’s name.

“You knew my mother,” he says, admittedly more of a statement than a question.

“Of course. I learned much sky and water magics under her tutelage; she was the kind of witch we all aspire to be.” Sombra’s smile turns affectionate. “If she saw you today, she would be…”

Mako steels himself for the same sentiment he’s heard from countless others before. _She would be so proud of you, she would be so happy for your success…_

Sombra’s smile turns into a sudden frown. “...Conflicted.”

Mako nearly chokes on his drink.

“Take off your glasses,” Sombra commands.

“No,” he immediately responds. “I refuse.”

Sombra’s smile turns disarming. She reaches across the table, “Come on,” she says. “You can trust me.”

Mako flinches away when he feels static electricity zap at the skin of his forearm, which he didn’t realize he had been resting on the table. In the wake of the sensation, small sparkling purple hexagons fizzle out of existence.

“I can’t,” he insists, even though he feels a sudden, overwhelming urge to follow through on her request. Sombra simply sits back in her chair, still smiling, taking a sip of sangria. She says nothing, but as the seconds tick by, the urge gets stronger and harder to resist.

“What did you do to me?” he asks. He has to use his own strength to keep his hands down from his face.

“You know…” Sombra says, tilting her head to the side. “Given all the evidence presented so far, I really shouldn’t be surprised at the power you already have, but it really is something else to _feel_ it for myself.”

Mako feels himself starting to sweat under the force of fighting the compulsion. Sombra holds out her hand, palm-up, as if she knows the exact timing of when his fortitude will finally crack. Mako squeezes his eyes shut as his hands, as if under command of someone else, come up to his head and take his glasses off, placing them upside down in Sombra’s waiting hand.

She takes them and simply places them atop her head, like a pair of vacationer’s sunglasses.

He feels his own control return to his body. She can control him like a puppet just by lifting a single finger, and in that moment he realizes that everything he already knew about witchcraft was nothing but a child’s crayon drawing compared to the entirety of the Louvre. She could kill him effortlessly if she wanted; he’d might as well humor her, for fear of what would happen otherwise.

Mako lifts his head and opens his eyes to look at Sombra.

The eye on his right eye is nothing but inky black from edge to edge, his iris lost in the darkness. The only thing that indicates there’s an eyeball at all is the wet reflection of light off of its surface, making it almost impossible to tell where he’s actually looking. His left eye has a similar abyssal darkness to it, except for the halo of a glowing, cool-colored white iris around his pupil.

“Oh, _pobrecito,”_ Sombra coos with genuine sympathy. “Your mother really did a number on you, didn’t she?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel and Ren for supporting me this month!


	10. X

His mother did a number on him?

“No,” Mako retorts. “It was a demon who cursed me, in retaliation for her crossing it.”

Sombra smirks. “Is that what she told you?”

Mako opens his mouth to retort, but Sombra’s question casts enough doubt that he can no longer have confidence in his argument. Yes, that is what she told him. He had not been there to witness it happen, nor was there another person to tell him the story of what had happened...but he’d never caught his mother in a lie; she’d always been blunt and honest with him, even at a young age. It’s hard to imagine that she would have obscured the truth, especially with something as dire as this.

“...What would you tell me?” he asks.

“I suppose that depends on what damage control I have to run. Tell me more about what you understand about the situation.”

Mako sighs. He sits back in his chair, taking his sangria with him.

“I knew she was a witch,” he starts. “I knew that’s what had her travelling abroad so much. I don’t know what that meant, and I still don’t. I tried teaching myself...some of her practice...with the things I found around the house, and she got mad at me when she caught me doing it. Told me that working with magic--with demons--was dangerous… that when she made a pact with a demon for power in exchange for her firstborn daughter and had a son instead, the demon had cursed me with the ability to see their kind. To live in fear and paranoia all of my life.”

Sombra lets out a thoughtful hum when enough time passes to indicate that Mako has finished talking. She takes a long sip of her own drink as Moira apparently naps on her lap.

“I was about to judge Nikora for lying to you, as much as I can understand why she would, but I can appreciate that she still took responsibility for her actions.”

Mako lets out a long exhale. She can tell him whatever she wants, but he’ll take every word with a grain of salt.

“What is the truth, then?”

“She’s the one who cursed you,” Sombra says, with a bluntness that reminds Mako of her. “Not to see demons, but to be blind to angels.”

It’s the second time for her to mention angels, and Mako feels his gut instinctually sink, even though he doesn’t know why. He waits for her to elaborate, but she seems more intent to simply absorb his reactions as they come.

“I don’t understand,” he finally admits.

“Of course you don’t,” she says. Sombra raises her arms and waves them in a slow arc in front of her. In the wake of her hands, semitransparent holograms appear like screens playing video. “It’s all been kept a secret from you this entire time.”

Of the three screens, the first one is of what looks to be somewhere beyond Earth’s stratosphere, what with the backdrop of stars and distant planets. The subject of the video...Mako isn’t sure what it is, because in one moment he feels like he’s looking at some kind of a machine, and then the next it seems like a living organism. At its centre is some kind of blinding light and, surrounded by an equally blinding halo of light, countless long, thin limbs along its sides reach out and ravenously grab handfuls of some invisible substance. Flocks of creatures, too distant to make out what they truly are, flow in and out of a ribcage-like body and the light contained within. It fills Mako with a sense of dread that he’d never experienced before as his attention is pulled to the next video.

It appears to be some kind of worship session. A dozen or so people are gathered around a central speaker, who is providing a sermon in a language Mako doesn’t recognise. Behind him are two unsettling humanoid creatures, though they resemble more skeletons than humans; their heads are eyeless and, in fact, are devoid of any facial features.  Their skin is as if sheer cloth has pulled against a face. They wear some kind of armour-like raiments, looking like mother of pearl and gilded with gold. They hold massive scythes that aren’t at all proportionally sized to their wielders. The speaker says his last words, and the fellowship repeats the last line, before downing small cups of red liquid. The creatures stand with an eerie stillness, and as those in the audience start to choke, they step forward and make wide, gentle swipes at the group of people. As they suffer the effects of poison, the scythes slice through the air over the people and, while they leave the physical bodies untouched, glassy smoke clones are knocked from the bodies, heads rolling. The speaker stands among the harvested bodies, looking smug, as one of the two figures holds out a crystal ball. The glassy figures of the group dissolve and absorb into the crystal ball like smoke into a vacuum, and when there is nothing left, countless feathered wings appear at their backs and they take off, directly up into the sky.

The third video is of Sombra. There is a demon beside her, but Mako doesn’t recognise the family. The demon appears as if female, though her face is that of calavera, much more like an actual skull than simply facial make-up, though nonetheless strikingly beautiful. Her hair is long, raven-black, and ornamented with dark purple roses. She stands back-to-back with Sombra while wearing a dress reminiscent of the traditional Chiapas look, but with a dramatically off-the-shoulder cut, and instead of colourful flower embroidery, there are intricately stitched, glowing purple circuitry, in a half-regular, half-irregular pattern like a motherboard and the edges of her dress are lined with silver accents. Sombra, on the other hand, is wearing a modern mini-skirt and leggings, an off-the-shoulder top held up by spaghetti strings. She reaches into the bell of her long sleeves and pulls out a submachine gun, though it looks more like a jewelled ornament than the weapon it’s supposed to be, given its amethyst-like body and silver accents. She aims it into the distance, and the camera angle rotates to their back to show the massive creature the two of them are facing. It’s the size of several blocks, surely several miles long, and has the body most like a long-legged crocodile and the face of a turbine engine. There’s an unearthly screech, and with it comes an incredible gust of wind. The she-demon sets off in a dramatic leap towards the monster, while Sombra trains her weapon at it. Combat ensues, but it’s hard for Mako to make out the exact details before the anxiety that consumes him from staring at the incomprehensible beast tears his eyes away.

An ear-aching silence falls between them. Mako finds himself leaning forward over the table, staring into his glass of sangria, anxiety choking out his ability to breathe; it’s like being faced with a hungry predator, but he knows, logically, that they’re just video. Sombra waves her hands again and the videos disappear. Mako looks up at the bartender at the other side of the room. He either is ignoring it or hasn’t even noticed that the woman materialised holograms out of nowhere; he turns his attention to his drink.

“Be thankful there’s a filter,” Sombra says, as Mako starts pounding down his barely touched glass. “The uninitiated fall into psychosis when they see an angel for the first time.”

Mako empties his drink and slams it back down on the table, feeling the anxiety building into an unearthly itching, painful throb in his brain. As he supports his head in his hand with his elbow on the table, Sombra takes the opportunity to fill his glass once again.

“This is the truth; the life and the war that your mother thought she could save you from.”

“This is what she did? Every time she went abroad…?”

“That’s correct,” Sombra says. “She was telling you the truth when she said she sold vacationer real estate, but rarely did those trips really have anything to do with her day job.”

“She didn’t die in the tsunami,” he says, a question posed as a statement.

Sombra nods solemnly. “We lost Nikora and the Banks Peninsula to Paradiso that day.”

“I…” Mako doesn’t know what to say. His head is full of different thoughts that may have been more coherent if they bothered coming at him one at a time, but they stew in a broth of anxiety and fear. He tries a second time, opening his mouth but only silence comes out; it would probably help if he could breathe.

“Mako. Do you want to get some fresh air?” 

He nods. Moira hops off of Sombra’s lap as she stands, placing a hand on Mako’s arm to gently urge him to stand as well. He follows her across the bar, up a flight of stairs different from the ones he came up, and finds himself in a small lobby surrounded by doors, two on each wall, slightly ajar. Sombra leads him through one, and he barely notices the bedroom-like setup of the room as they cross it, leading him to a balcony with a view over the Yarra.

Mako helps himself to a chair on the balcony and closes his eyes. He tries to forget what he’s seen, focusing only on forcing himself to breathe, in on the count of five, out on the count of five. Sombra stands behind him, even though there’s a second chair, and kneads careful fingers into the meat of his shoulder, expertly avoiding nicking him with her nails. He feels like his breathing exercises are more effective than usual, but he can feel a pleasurable tingle from Sombra’s fingertips, and figures that she’s helping him calm down through magic. He’s hardly motivated to complain.

He’d thought that he was scared of demons before. Compared to this visceral response, he feels as if he’d been mistaking shyness for fear this entire time. Had he really feared demons, or did he just have a healthy respect for their boundaries?

“Is this why she blinded me?” Mako asks, when he feels his heartbeat return to normal. “Because she knew that I would be frightened of them?”

“Dios mio, that’s not the case at all,” she says sweetly, empathetically. “Even fully-fledged witches like myself fear them, because fear is what keeps us alive.”

Mako isn’t sure if he believes her. She didn’t seem very fearful in that video she showed him, but every syllable of her words sound genuine.

“She blinded you,” Sombra continues, “because she thought you’d never be able to defend yourself.”

“I’d never learn how to if I couldn’t see them,” he argues.

“No, no, it’s not just a matter of learning how to. A demon would never make a pact with you, as a man.”

“Pact?” he asks, turning to look at her.

“Mm-hmm. Do you recall the demon that was standing beside me?”

“Yeah. I didn’t recognise her.”

“Her name is Condesa Itzpapalotl. She is my combat partner and the demon that I made a pact with. She granted me this…”

Sombra leans over as she reaches for the holster on her thigh--the holster that isn’t there. She pulls that amethyst gun as if from the shadows, showing it to him; he can see more details of it in person, all of the intricate carvings within the stone and metal, the glowing ports, a series of colourful gemstones on its upper edge. The curved ammo cartridge coming out of the bottom of it has no bullets in it, but there are silver details to make it almost seem as such.

“...as my weapon to fight angels.”

“I don’t see how that has anything to do with my gender.”

Sombra shrugs. “I don’t either, but for whatever reason, demons refuse to make pacts with men. They’ll never tell us why.”

Mako sighs. The rain has cut down to just a drizzle, and the majority of falling rain is the droplets coming off of roofs and balconies. The moist, cool air feels nice against his flushed face, and he finally relaxes--as much as he can--in the chair. Sombra replaces her weapon within the shadows of her dress.

“I’ll go get our drinks,” She says, after a long pause. She leaves Mako alone with his thoughts for a while, and when she returns with their glasses and pitcher, he looks toward her.

“It’s funny,” he says, as she places the items on the table, then takes a seat next to him. “My mother always told me that I could be whoever I wanted, if I put in the time and the effort...except one.”

“She’s not wrong,” she says, with a shrug. “You could still be a witch, if you wanted to.”

“You just told me that I can’t.”

“I never said such a thing.” She gives him a sly smirk. “Because, if I’m right--and I usually am--you’ve got a ace up your sleeve. Do you know why Jamie was exiled from Inferno?”

“Honestly, I had no idea he was an exile. Or that one could be exiled from Inferno.”

Sombra chuckles, but not at Mako’s expense. “If you’ve ever run into an amputated demon, they’ve either run into a demon hunter or successfully escaped from the Trial of Exile,” she explains, “and the gravest of all acts for a demon is to have free will. If you know enough about infernal law, you can tell what their sentence was from their wounds: the notches in Jamie’s tail indicate that he fell in love.”

Mako falls silent. He vividly remembers those notches in Jamie’s knife-shaped spade the first day he saw him and thinking it was odd, but it’s not like he could ask. “With whom…?”

“Nobody knows. Not even Jamie. They broke his mind during his Trial and removed all memories of what happened. He’s been plagued with an aching loneliness ever since...well, until he met you.”

Mako scoffs. “That’s hard to believe.”

“I mean it! I know most humans can be far-removed from their instincts, but they can all feel that there’s something off about him, and not just his eccentric nature. Great for picking up people for one-night stands, not so great for finding a partner. Or a job.”

In retrospect, he doesn’t know why he hasn’t figured that out himself. “And how does this give me an advantage?”

“He might pact with you,” she says. “Exercise his free will to make an agreement no other demon in their right mind would make. We would be able to use magic to undo Nikora’s curse, and you would live a new, immortal life as one of Earth’s defenders, with Jamie by your side.”

“Otherwise…?”

“You live the rest of your life as the normal human you always have been, leaving Jamie behind when your time comes. Mind you--he may take the selfless route and insist that you stay that way, because immortal life can be more of a curse than a blessing.”

“I’ll do it.”

Sombra is stunned for a split second. She turns to him with amusement in her tone. “Are you sure?” she asks. “This isn’t a decision that should be made lightly.”

“I’m not making it lightly,” he argues. “I was ready to clock out until I met Jamie. It’s always been in the back of my mind that when I pass, our time together will have felt fleeting for the both of us.”

“That’s very romantic, but love shouldn’t be the only reason. You will be tasked with hunting angels like the rest of us, else Jamie will wither to a husk.”

“That’s not all I have to be concerned with.”

The sentiment brings Sombra to attention. She leans towards him, putting weight on her forearm. “Oh…?”

“To be a witch means to be a protector,” he says. “To overcome your own fear and become the champion of those who would be victims otherwise.”

“How strange, it almost seems like this is something you’ve done before…” She tilts her head to the side and gives him an all-knowing smirk. “...Roadhog.”

A chill runs down his spine and through his fingertips. He stares at her, and she doesn’t back down or falter from the direct eye contact. He swallows hard.

“How do you know that name?”

Sombra chuckles with amusement. She sits back in her chair and turns over her hand to hold it palm-up. Another holographic video comes up; they’re a series of televised newscasts, featuring headlines like Biker Gang Fights for Justice for Abuse Victims and Motorcyclist Run for Charity. 

In the videos, there’s a figure of Mako’s weight and stature. He has shorter hair, pulled up into a short ponytail that sticks up behind him, and a gas mask resembling a pig face. He usually stands in the background of the videos, imposingly silent. Even with his face hidden, it’s still obvious that it’s Mako by the belly tattoo and the custom bike he’s shown to ride.

The last video is the only grim one. Woman commits suicide after conviction of husband--

Mako’s hand jolts over to Sombra’s side, pushing her arm away and toward her body as if it would close the video. It does close, but only by Sombra’s will, and despite the fact that she would be able to fight off Mako’s strength, she doesn’t try. She looks at him without any surprise; just an empathetic frown.

“Do you snoop on all of Jamie’s boyfriends, or just the ones you take a liking to?” he growls.

“When I found out you had witch blood,” she says softly, “I had to make sure you weren’t a threat to him.”

Mako stares at her for a bit longer, then sighs, taking his hand away from her.

“This is your last chance,” she says. She stands up slightly to change the angle of her chair to face Mako a little more directly. “After this, there is no turning back.”

She holds out her arms, with her hands closed and facing down. She turns her right hand over and opens it, revealing a semi-clear blue capsule.

“You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed and live whatever life you want to.”

She turns her left hand over and reveals a semi-clear red capsule.

“You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.”

There’s a long, awkward silence as Mako stares incredulously at her. “...The Matrix? Really?”

Sombra gives a one-shouldered shrug. “What? It’s my favourite movie.”

Mako rolls his eyes, unable to hold back his smirk. If he had any doubts that Jamie and her were actual friends, they aren’t around any longer. For what it’s worth, her sense of humour has eased some of the tension that had been building with the weight of the decision. He reaches for the red pill and as their hands touch, Sombra speaks up again:

“Remember, Mako…”

He looks up at her.

“You ran away from New Zealand when your mother died, and you ran away from America when Samantha died. You will no longer have that luxury. You will have to take your perceived failures in stride.”

He nods. “Understood,” he affirms, and throws the pill back, using a swig of sangria to wash it down. He places it back down on the table and gestures to the drink. “...I can take it with alcohol, right?”

“Oh yeah,” Sombra says, waving dismissively. “It’s just a magic suppressant so that your instinctive magic won’t be blocking our attempts to break the curse.”

“Out of curiosity, what was the other one?”

She shrugs. “Liquid acetaminophen.”

Mako barks out a laugh. “I can see why the two of you became friends.”

The two of them settle back into their chairs, sipping the rest of their drink. At some point, Moira shows up once again, jumping up on to Mako’s shoulders and mewling to announce her presence; she invites herself to lay across Mako’s thick shoulder and accepts his scritching fingers on her forehead, purring contentedly.

At some point, Sombra holds her hand over the balcony railing, holding it up toward the sky.

“It’s kicked in,” she says, and hands Mako his glasses as she stands up. “Let’s head out, our time is limited.”

“How do you know?” Mako asks. He stands up, and puts on his glasses, and follows Sombra out of the room. Moira stays on his shoulders, apparently comfortable with her high perch.

“You haven’t figured it out?”

He shrugs silently.

“The weather is your fault,” she explains. “Uncontrollable sorrow meets uncontrollable magic potential, and you get record-breaking weather.”

Suddenly he feels self-conscious. All of that internal whining about the weather and he had been the source of it? “Do all witches do that?”

“Not all of them. I can’t. And even if we could, we would be...adept enough to make sure it didn’t happen.”

“Point taken,” he grumbles.

The rest of their walk is relatively quiet. He dares not to ask where they’re going, as his mind is too busy considering the massive change his life is going to make. He feels less anxious, less doubtful about this choice than he thinks he should be, even though he still has the chance to change his mind. It feels like the right thing to do.

His daydreaming comes to a stop when he realises that they’re approaching a storm drain entrance; on either side they’re surrounded by tall concrete walls covered in colourful tags that remind him of their date on Hosier Lane. Two young men stand just before the drain entrance and give subtle nods to Sombra and Mako as they approach, then follow after them as they enter the drain, holding lanterns to illuminate the way.

This is how I die, Mako thinks to himself.

After a few turns and curves in gradually shrinking size, they finally come to a section that is far more spacious without any transition. It’s the size of an auditorium, lit with strings of fairy lights, string lights, and wall-mounted electric torches. The two men leave them at the entrance and walk away from where they came, leaving Sombra and Mako to themselves...or at least it feels as such.

Out of the shadows cast in the chamber step a few alarmingly familiar faces; Sombra introduces them in turn:

Lena Oxton, nickname “Tracer”, the Witch of Time, accompanied by her demon, Lady Fortuna. Tracer is as he remembers her from the Christmas party, dressed in tight, sporty clothing that doesn’t leave a lot of imagination when it comes to her legs. Lady Fortuna, on the other hand, wears a dramatically layered, thick, fur-lined gown with a hood that covers her eyes. Behind her hovers the massive mantle of a gold, roman-numeral clock that has far too many hands moving at different speeds. Her hands are hidden in a muff.

Fareeha Amari, nickname “Pharah”, the Witch of Sky, accompanied by her demon, Mother Horus. While Pharah wears a plain loose tank top and a skirt, Mother Horus wears a skin-tight dress that ends at her thighs. large set of wings cling to her silhouette, making a gown-like appearance out of it. She has a massive golden hawk’s head that snaps to attention like that of a corvid and she stands at an alarmingly tall height.

The last one is the only one Mako doesn’t recognise. It’s Fareeha’s mother, Ana Amari, the Witch of Death, accompanied by her demon, Queen Anubis. Like Mother Horus, the male diety’s name has no bearing on the demon’s feminine appearance. She has extremely dramatic curves that seem just slightly outside the realm of human possibility, and they’re all brought to an exaggerated statement by the jewel- and gemstone-laden dress that sways with every movement. Her jackal head commands more attention than her body, carrying an air of confidence and command even beyond the other demons currently present. Ana herself is dressed in a comfortable, brightly-coloured sundress, but most of it is hidden under a contrastingly dark shawl. She has long white hair that rivals that of Mako’s, but she has it tied into a modest ponytail, wearing the age of a sun-beaten life on her dark complexion, and an eyepatch over her right eye.

“She is our elected Superior,” Sombra adds. “To lead us, train us, and keep our mission cohesive.”

“You have grown so much,” Ana coos, reaching out to take Mako’s massive hand in her own, stroking the back of it affectionately. “And to be as beautiful as your mother.”

“I’m sorry,” he responds. “I don’t recall ever meeting you.”

“We met when you were a newborn,” she explains. “Let’s see…” She squints. “Thirty--?”

“Forty,” he corrects.

“Forty years! My, time does fly. Magic has been kind to you. I must admit, I regret advising Nikora to do what she did; your innate talent is palpable.” He tone is sweet, so it’s difficult for Mako to find it within himself to be angry with her for making such a decision without his input. “Nonetheless, I’m glad to have the chance to undo it.”

Mako glances off to the side. He catches sight of Tracer drawing ornate sigils on the ground with some kind of phosphorescent paste, while Pharah distributes a strange selection of gems, small animal and insect carcasses, and stones on the ground; together, they begin to make a pattern on the ground around the two of them. Their respective demons stand in silent watch, but Sombra is nowhere to be found.

“Is this...all of you?” he asks, desperate to change the topic.

“Not at all,” Ana answers. “This is just a small fraction of our self-governed Coven-- those of us who have agreed that our purpose is not solely for a bid for power, but to protect the Earth and everything that lives on it. We are an even smaller fraction of witches worldwide.”

Mako nods in understanding. His attention is caught by movement in the corner of his eye and finds Condesa Itzpapalotl carrying a massive blow-up pool full of basic-looking water over her head as if it were weightless, and Sombra holding a large utility bucket at her side. Come to think of it, wouldn’t that kind of pool collapse without a rigid bottom…?

Ana leads him away from their odd-looking circle of miscellaneous items and Condesa Itzpapalotl places the pool at the centre of it.

“You will want to undress,” Ana says. “Unless you want to get your clothes stained.”

Mako hums in acknowledgement and starts stripping himself of his clothes, thinking that any other guy might feel some kind of trepidation about getting naked in the company of women who could kill with a single touch…

But what does he have to lose?

He folds up his clothes neatly and puts them on the floor on top of his shoes. He takes his hair out of its ponytail as well, leaving him as naked as the day he was born. When he turns to the pool, he finds Sombra pouring the contents of the bucket into the pool. He can’t recognise all of it, but he can identify things like rose petals, stems of saffron, whole star anise. The surface of the water becomes a fluid layer of floating herbs, and Mako has to be honest: it smells really nice.

“I presume I’m supposed to lay in that,” Mako says, looking to Ana. She nods, and once Sombra is finished distributing the herbs, Mako steps into the water, then carefully lowers himself to lay down. It’s shallow, yet deep enough to come up over his ears, making the world a little more muffled. The water is somewhat chilly against his skin, just slightly out of his comfort zone, but he sighs, closes his eyes, and tries to relax.

The eight women surround him, two on each side of the pool. The demons start chanting in perfect time in Enochian, and even though there’s only four of them, it sounds like there’s at least a dozen people; either by virtue of their own voices, the echoing noises of the chamber, or through the muffled effect of the water.

He senses a disturbance in the water. It gets chillier, all the sudden, and he feels a compulsion to open his black eye, and when he does, he finds Ana’s cupped hands hovering above it. The other women have the fingers of their right hands dipped into the water, sending glowing ripples through it. Ana cracks her hands and the herb-infused water pours from it directly onto his exposed eyeball--but instead of being cold, it’s scalding hot.

Mako lets out a pained grunt that turns into a growl when it doesn’t stop. The hot water only seems to increase in temperature as the chanting continues, sending it all the way up to boiling. Or maybe it’s his eyeball itself that is boiling; he can feel the acid-like ache all the way back to his optic nerve and he can feel more and more burning liquid streaming down his face. Even though he’s unable to close his eye, he can no longer see -- a blackness had started from the corners of his vision and worked its way in. At some point, he starts screaming, his high pain tolerance finally breaking under the agony of feeling like his own eyeball was distilling itself out of his face.

At some point...it finally stops.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel and Ren for supporting me this month!
> 
> Find me on Tumblr [here!](http://murasakidoku.tumblr.com/)


	11. XI

It’s a beautiful morning.

The sun shines through the windows with an oppressively cheerful light. It prevents even the thought of sleeping in, but why would he? After all, he has nothing to do...and Jamie is here.

Mako brings up his hand and blindly feels for Jamie’s rib cage. He sinks his fingers into the other’s skin, rubbing his fingers over the series of ribs that slowly expand and contract with his sleeping breaths. Eventually, the breathing evens out into a singsongy giggle.

“You’re tickling me,” he half-complains. Mako smirks to himself under his CPAP mask and doesn’t stop, inching up Jamie’s side and under his armpit. Jamie yelps through a laugh, finally having his fill. He tries to crawl away and sit up, but Mako is quicker with his arm. He stops tickling to wrap it around Jamie’s waist before he can get too far away, reeling him in and pressing him up against Mako’s soft belly and chest. Jamie squirms and flops, trying with futile effort to get out of the grip. Mako has a low chuckle in his chest the whole time.

Eventually, Jamie gives up, huffing angrily, his arms crossed over his chest. With his submission, Mako finally lets him go, and he takes the opportunity to crawl all over Mako, planting kisses along the edges of his mask. Mako chuckles once again, reaching up to take a hold of Jamie’s sides but not to keep him in place. 

Eventually, Jamie manages to get up and above Mako, settling around his head and against the wall of plushies. As he settles around Mako’s head, he starts purring deeply.

Wait.

_Purring?_

“Since when do you purr?” Mako asks with clarity, even though his mask is still firmly attached to his face.

“I don’t,” he says simply and dismissively, and not even a second passes before reality vanishes into black.

Mako lets out a sigh before actually bothering to open his eyes. It figures that the only happy moment he could muster these last few days was obtainable through dreams. Slowly, as consciousness comes back to him, he notices that even though the dream has ended, the purring has not.

He opens his eyes...or, rather, just his left eye, as his right is numb and unresponsive. He’s surrounded by a room that is equal parts familiar and unfamiliar, and only after he takes in a few details, like the colour of the walls and the arrangement of furniture, does he recognise this as the guest bedroom of Tracer’s summer home. Mako turns his head to the source of the purring, finding the silhouette of Moira’s lithe frame pressed against the right side of his head and almost _aggressively_ purring.

He’s set up with a generic, hospital-issued CPAP mask that isn’t at all calibrated to the settings he likes. A line connects the inner part of his elbow to a saline drip. A computer stands by to occasionally take his blood pressure.

What kind of shit did he get up to last night…? He doesn’t even remember.

Mako brings up a hand to itch part of his face and touches bandage instead.

_Oh. Right._

It makes sense why they’d bring him to familiar territory afterwards. It’s not like he could get lugged back up through his busy condo complex without turning heads, no matter what hour it was. It’s the last coherent, full thought he has before easing himself into snoozing, feeling a lethargy that he figures is coming from some kind of pain reliever. There’s something very hypnotic about Moira’s purring on top of that.

It was early afternoon when he first awoke, but it’s late evening by the time he truly comes back around. This time, it’s the sound of a red-headed woman coming into the room. He remembers her from the party: Emily, Tracer’s girlfriend. He lifts his head up enough to remove his mask, but Moira stays glued to the spot.

“Hey,” she greets with a smile, upon seeing that he’s awake.

“Hi,” he exchanges, and she starts looking at his vitals.

“How are you feeling?”

“Out of it, but fine,” he answers. “Are you a witch too?”

Emily laughs. “No, just married to one.” She holds up her hand and fans her fingers to show a modest gold ring. He hadn’t noticed it before; he simply stopped giving it consideration past the fact they were together. “But I’ve been administering Tracer’s potions to you through IV, so I’m a nurse by trade but a witch in imagination.”

“You must hold the greatest tea parties,” he says, and there’s a small beat before he thinks to himself _why did I say that?_

She rolls with it though. “Maybe I’ll invite you to the next one. How’s your pain?”

“Not feeling anything,” he answers.

“Even when you look around?”

“Nope.”

“Great, then we can take you off of this…”

She starts working on taking his IV out. She undoes his blood pressure cuff as well.

“You’re free to relax or get up as you please--don’t push yourself, and if you get dizzy at all, lay down as soon as possible. You want something to eat?”

Oh, food sounds _so_ good right now. Normally he wouldn’t trust someone else with cooking for him, but he remembers the two of them talking vegetarian over the party; apparently his non-meat substitutes had been quite the conversation piece.

“Yeah.”

“One bowl of Emily’s famous udon stir fry, coming right up!” she chirps, then leaves the room. “Don’t be afraid to shout if you need anything!” she calls behind her.

Mako doesn’t say anything. He waits for a few minutes after she’s left to get up and try to feel-remember where the bathroom is (with Moira tailing him) and when he finds it he takes a good, hard look at himself in the mirror.

His right eye is completely patched over with white bandage; some kind of black liquid has seeped through at the middle, acting almost like blood. His left eye is untouched; his cornea still ink-black and a eerie white halo of an iris trapped inside of it. He wonders if his right eye will look like that now. He looks around the room, feeling his eyeball move as it should, with no pain. 

He’s wearing a generic hospital gown with some abstract, repeating design on it. His lower face is covered with a days old stubble, but even if he had the motivation to ask if they have any spare razors, he wouldn’t have the energy to actually shave. His hair is pulled back with a low ponytail, and when he flips it to the front, he can see that most of the herbs from the water have been picked out, but there are still stragglers. He still smells like the suspension, still sweet and earthy but frankly too much of a reminder of the pain from last night.

He assumes it was last night.

“Emily,” he calls.

“Yeah?”

“Can I take a shower?”

“Sure! Just don’t get your bandages wet. Oh! And your clothes are in the guest room, on the chair next to the closet.”

Mako closes the door and turns the faucet on to an acceptable temperature. He steps in, rinses his hair to rid it of the left over particles, and gives half a thought to washing his hair. He decides against it when he realises that his choices are _Red Enhancer_ and a set of _Herbal Essences._ After physically turning his nose up at the options, he settles on just a rinse and spending the next few minutes letting hot water run over him.

Once he feels sufficiently woken up, he steps out and towel-dries off, then covers himself just enough with the hospital gown to move back into the bedroom and change into his clothes. Moira hops up onto the bed, keeping an apparently ever-vigilant eye on him, but it doesn’t really bother him. He changes, even with her watching, and when he’s done he reaches over and gives her thorough head-scritches. She drinks in the affection, happily rubbing her head against his fingers.

When he comes back down the hall, he finds a single hearty bowl of stir-fry on the dining table. Since Emily is busy cleaning dishes in the kitchen, and there isn’t a second bowl waiting to be eaten, he sits at the table and digs in while Moira jumps up and lays across his knees, the only place on his lap where there’s space for her.

Eating alone feels eerily nostalgic, and not in a good way. The silence is uncomfortable, even in his solitude; he’s gotten so used to listening to Jamie ramble during their shared meals, passing the time with his earnest train of thought, that meals went by in what felt like seconds. Now, he’s acutely aware of how much time each bite takes, every movement of his jaw taking ages, every swallow a significant effort. Eating becomes a labor he hasn’t known before.

His fork clatters against the side of the bowl when his hand decides it’s had enough. He scoots his chair back a good distance from the table and drapes his arm across the table as he leans forward to rest his forehead against it; it’s difficult to sit this way with the bulk of his gut in the way, but he’s too lethargic to get up and lay down.  Moira stands up on his knees, her front paws against his belly, so that she can reach up to headbutt his chin.

It makes him feel a little better, but not significantly.

Emily comes into the room, summoned by the sound of the clatter, but she says nothing. She simply pulls out a chair and sits on it, reaching out to place a hand on Mako’s shoulder.

“It’s nice to know there are men out there who aren’t afraid to feel,” she says. “Most of them try to hide it behind a mask."

After a moment, Mako looks up at her. The shift in gravity pulls down a tear that was building at the corner of his eye, and he decides, _fuck it,_ and takes off his glasses to put them on the table. Momentarily throwing out his attempts to maintain some kind of tough image, he scoops up Moira and cradles her between his thick forearms and his stomach. She purrs with unbridled intensity.

“I did,” he admits, “for a time. I actually thought I’d...gotten over it.”

“The coven had provided a distraction,” she offers.

“But the weather…”

“Magic suppressant in the IV.” Emily shrugs. “It’ll run out in a few hours.”

Mako hums in acknowledgement. A silence falls between them for a moment.

“We all miss him, though not as gravely as you. I don’t know you as well as I know him, but from what I’ve seen, you two...well, bring a new meaning to the phrase ‘an item’.”

He appreciates the sentiment, but he aches for _a distraction_ again, so he tries to change the subject. “What kind of nurse did you say you were?”

“Well, right now, I’m an on-call nurse for the assisted living home down the road,” she shrugs a shoulder in the direction. “But for the longest time I was a nurse in the E.R. That’s how I met Lena, actually. She was bringing in some people that had been involved in an attack…”

He wants to follow that up with some kind of question, keep the conversation going, but his thoughts keep coming back to Jamie. He knew how to hold his own conversations, allowing Mako a comfortable backseat ride to actually talking to someone. When it was just the two of them, they could go on for hours. But Emily isn’t like Jamie. Emily doesn’t go on like he does.

His vision of the woman turns blurry.

“Mako,” she says gently, turning her head to the side and speaking sweetly, “when I said you shouldn’t get your bandages wet, that included crying.”

“Sorry,” he murmurs.

“It's alright,” she comforts as she stands up. “May as well let it flush itself,” she says as she carefully peels the bandage from his skin. It puts up a bit of a fight but it doesn't hurt. She leaves his side for a moment and he feels relief with the fresh air on his skin, but finds that he still can't open his eye. When Emily returns, she draws gauze pads up against his cheek, sopping up the fluid that runs down.

He turns to her as she switches out to a new dry gauze, the spent one left on the table. No blood, but the fluid is… Black?

“Black tears?” He asks, incredulously. “Didn't that emo shit fall out of fashion years ago?”

Emily laughs despite herself. “I dunno, I think it kinda suits you.”

He huffs out a half laugh. She's not wrong.

“What's the situation, anyway? Why can't I open my eye?”

“It's...stitched closed,” she explains slowly. “The structure of your eye isn't compromised or anything, but there's a physical recovery happening inside it. If you could open it, everything would seem painfully bright. At least that's now Lena explained it to me. It won't be like that for any longer than twenty-four hours.”

“I didn't realise it would be so involved,” he admits. “I honestly thought that someone was just gonna...wave their hand and it'd be fixed.”

“Magic isn't a shortcut or wish fulfilment like the media likes to portray,” she says with a shrug, wiping his cheek again. “It's a science all unto itself. You'll learn it with time.”

“Why do you get to know any of this? As a normal human, I mean.”

“I had to make a very grave agreement with Lena. Even if we break up, I must keep her secrets.”

A moment passes. His tears dry up, and Emily uses a wetted cotton ball to clean up the rest. Instead if setting him up with a new bandage, she hands him his glasses. Reluctantly moving his hand away from the purring cat in his lap, he takes them from her and puts them on.

“I don't envy you,” she says, as she sits back down.  “You're very brave to take on this new life. I mean, I worked in an emergency room for years, and it got to be too much.”

“Can I be honest?”

“Sure. You've got nothing to lose."

“I'm not as scared as I think I should be. As if I don't think I truly understand the gravity of what I've signed up for. I keep considering the possibility that I made this decision for the wrong reasons.”

Emily sighs and leans back in her chair, idly fiddling with an unused gauze.

“You're a sensitive man,” she starts. “But you're a logical one too. I think you made the decision with your logical side, but you're worried that you made it with your emotional side. And how I feel about it...I think, regardless what parts of you made the decision, that it wasn't reckless. If I could have an immortal life with Lena in exchange for what you agreed to...as much as I hate to admit it, I would rather our time together be limited. Especially after seeing those videos that Sombra has. This eternal war is more than my brain could handle. And I think that...is more selfish than what you have signed up for.” She ends the sentiment with a shrug. “And I'm okay with being a selfish, flawed human being, and Lena is okay with that too.”

Mako hums. His fingers curl under Moira's chin, scratching her there, and she sticks out her head to allow him access.

“I wish I knew how Jamie felt about this,” he says. “I'm having to make all these assumptions when we've never had conversations about...well, all of this.”

“You didn't hear this from me…” she leans forward as if she was telling him a highly controversial secret. “...but all of the witches of the coven are pretty close friends with Jamie. They're all convinced that he'll jump at the chance to make a pact with you, and they've known him for centuries. The reason they haven't told you that's what they think is because they don't want to give you unrealistic expectations when they don't know for a fact one way or the other.”

“Do you think they'd be trying to convert me if they had greater doubts?”

She nods. “They wouldn't want you to be put at unnecessary risk.”

He lets out a noise of understanding. After another pause, she pushes the bowl of stir fry back towards Mako.

“Eat up and regain your strength,” she says. “If you're feeling up for it, you should visit Tracer at her bar for some initial training. You'll want as much at your disposal as possible when your vision develops.”

Mako nods and lets Moira back down onto his lap. He resumes eating, and it's a little less difficult than it was before. Emily keeping him company -- even though she spends her time on her phone -- makes it a little easier to swallow.

He sticks around for a little longer until he starts feeling more like himself, which just so happens to be about when the sun sets. He bids farewell to Emily and calls a cab for a trip to _Epoch._

It's a fairly large bar in the CBD, a place that has firmly established itself amongst the queer community in Melbourne, especially with it's specialty and social nights. Mako has always wanted to check it out, but his years of being a social drinker are long behind him.

The crowd is what he expects from a bar on an early Wednesday night: enough warm bodies to make the place break even by last call. The decor here is exceptionally new-age and trendy, neon lights in unexpected edges and dark, contrasting shapes out of the furniture. There’s a dance floor in the distance, but unpopulated; the music playing over the loudspeaker is happy and prideful, but kept at a low enough volume that conversation flows easily. Mako sits at the bar attended by a familiar pixie-cut brunette. She’s wearing tasteful makeup and a well-tailored suit, and smiles when she spots him.

“I like your suit,” Mako greets.

“Aw, cheers luv!” she chirps. “Take it you’re feeling better? Weather hasn’t turned sour again.”

“I’ve been trying to keep my mind off of it.”

“A good first step,” she agrees. “Want something to drink?” She waves a hand towards the black panels hanging above the board, painted in fluorescent paint that glows under direct blacklight. Every signature cocktail is named with community vernacular with short descriptions. _The Butch,_ gin and rum with lemon-lime soda; _Femme,_ puréed watermelon with rum and lemon juice; _Neutrois,_ cocoa liqueur, cream, and chocolate syrup with cinnamon powder; _Pride,_ rainbow layered fruits infused in bubbly -- the list goes on, and it’s an overwhelming selection for Mako. He doesn’t even know if he’s in the mood for any of this.

“You got any, uh...beer?”

Tracer giggles, then rolls her eyes with a smirk. “What self-respecting bar doesn’t have beer? But for the sake of demonstration, please…” Tracer gestures to the overhead board once again. “Humour me. It’s on the house, so don’t worry if you don’t like it.”

“Fine,” he says, with an acquiescent sigh. “What does Jamie usually get?”

“Well, he hasn’t been over recently, but…”

She looks up at the board.

“He usually gets less-sweet versions of our fruitier cocktails. He orders _Pride_ with a dryer champagne, and I’m pretty sure it’s because it means he gets to eat something on the go.”

“I’ll have that then. With the bubbly.”

“Fine choice!” She leans down under the bar top and starts to dig out the ingredients. She pops a new bottle of bubbly and sets out a cutting board full of a selection of different fruits in their respective containers, some of them in need of being cut in order to properly fit into the collins glass. 

“The most basic of tools in a witch’s arsenal is the ability to control the flow of time,” she starts, handing him an orange and placing a handful of strawberries front and centre on the cutting board. “Generally speaking, it’s to give us a combat advantage--”

Mako flinches as Tracer casually tosses a chef knife, sending it spinning several feet in the air. At the peak of its arc, it glints with the blacklight before sailing back down. Without even so much as using her eye for coordination, she catches the handle in her hand without skipping a beat. “--for precision, accuracy, evasion, and--”

With perceptively blinding speed, Tracer chops the tips off of each of four strawberries, and cuts each of them into chunky slivers all in the span of three seconds. It feels like she’ll cut off the tips of her own fingers by going so quickly, but the expression on her face carries the same casual nature of someone going at a comfortable speed.

“...to fill as much as we can in every passing second.”

She scoops up the strawberry slivers in her hand, pushing them into her palm with the edge of the blade. She dumps them into the glass and then tosses the knife into the air again, a much smaller arc and she catches the tip of the blade between her fingertips, then handing it over to Mako.

“But in your case, for now, it’ll be your saving grace. Angels can’t tell when time is being manipulated, so you must use that to your advantage to avoid their sight or attacks.”

Mako takes the handle of the blade and pulls it toward himself with the orange in his other hand. Hopefully she’s not expecting him to toss around a knife on day one. “Okay, so how do I do it?”

“You simply concentrate, and impress your will upon reality.”

He arches a brow at her, and she laughs.

“I mean it! It sounds like nonsense, but give it a try. It’s left open to interpretation for a reason.”

Mako slumps forward. He was hoping for some kind of...epiphany...or some kind of secret that he hadn’t keyed in on himself. But no, all she has to offer him is some cartoon bullshit like believing in yourself and making it happen.

Whatever.

Mako takes in a deep breath and lets it go. He closes his eyes--well, _eye_ — and takes mental inventory of the space around him. The music in the background, the incoherent conversation of strangers in the distance, Tracer’s fingers against the countertop, the heat that radiates off of the lighting fixtures in an otherwise cold room...

“Remember to focus on the task at hand,” she says, “or else it will become reeaaallllyyyyy….”

Mako opens his eye and looks up at Tracer, who is caught speaking in such slow motion that the words start to become indecipherable. The beat of the music is less of a bassline and more of a sluggish heartbeat that thrums in his head; he turns to look at the others in the distance and watches their mouths and facial expressions move as if captured by a high-speed camera.

It’s unnerving to see in person.

He turns back towards his fruit and with a careful meticulousness, he slips the edge of the blade into one end of the fruit and starts spiralling it down the rind. He focuses on the task with such severity that he can ignore the hot liquid dripping down his right cheek at an agonising pace. Once he gets to the other end, he takes the knife out and digs his thumb under the top and inches it under the spiral. Then, he pulls the skin from the fruit, leaving both skin and fruit in two whole pieces. 

He places both of them, along with the knife, on the cutting board, and he stops fixating on the world. Time resumes at a normal pace at the same rate that a throbbing headache sets in on his right side.

“...eeerrwhelming. Oh, wow! _Very_ good, Mako! You’re a natural!”

Mako wants to quip something about how it _needs_ to be something that comes natural to a witch, but he slumps over, holding his head in his hand and trying to not fixate on the ache, despite that being exceptionally hard.

“Let me get something for that,” she says, then ducks down for a napkin. Instead of handing it to him, though, she reaches out and presses it against his cheek. Normally he’d whine about his personal space being invaded, but for some reason he feels some sort of weird kinship with this woman he barely knows.

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that she saw him naked last night.

“You’re still having curse discharge,” she explains. “We won’t be able to release your eye until it dries up, so you still have some time to work on the basics before you see angels.”

Once his cheek is cleaned up, she pitches the napkin and starts cutting pieces out of the orange that Mako peeled. “Practice it when your head can handle it. Don’t stress yourself out, but it does get easier with time.”

Mako makes no comment. He just rests his head, relieved to feel that the throbbing headache is slowly subsiding while Tracer finishes up his drink.

“I mean it, by the way,” she adds as she hands him the finished drink. “I was expecting that it was going to take you several tries to get it. You really are Nikora’s son.”

“I don’t really understand,” he says, feeling well enough to finally sit up. “If every witch can do that, then why are you known as the Witch of Time?”

“Every witch can stop and slow time, to a certain limit. It’s a more unique skill to reverse or speed up time.”

Mako _hmms_ with interest as he takes a sip of his drink. “That sounds powerful.”

“It is. But it’s not without its drawbacks; one slip-up and I could get permanently stuck in the wrong time. Jamie actually helps me quite a bit with that, actually -- _Lilin_ milk is a powerful stabiliser.”

Mako chokes on his drink. Tracer laughs. Once his airway is clear again he asks, “so you’ve had sex with him?”

There’s no taking the smirk off of her face at this point. “Frankly, I don’t know anyone that _hasn’t._ ”

“So you’re not... _completely_ lesbian?”

She snorts in amusement, but the smirk hasn’t gone away. “I’m as gay as they come, love. Jamie just has a couple of parlour tricks he likes to share with the people who know the man behind the curtain, so to speak.”

Of course, how could Mako forget? _Lilin_ have the ability to change sex at will, enabling them to lure in the most amount of humans as possible. He considers this for a while...what would Jamie look like as a woman, both in his glamour and actual body?

Tracer, meanwhile, seems to read his mind. “ _You_ , on the other hand, are quite bisexual...aren’tcha?” she asks, while reaching behind her to pull out her phone and scroll through her photo reel.

“Guilty as charged,” he admits. She presents her phone to him and he takes it to look at the picture she wants to show him: it’s a selfie of her, Emily, and Jamie. Jamie’s face has rounded out to a long heart-shape, and she’s wearing some rather striking and appealing make-up. Her hair is long, fluffy, and layered. The only thing that makes the transformation seem like a last-minute thing is that she didn’t bother to change her wardrobe at all; he can tell because Jamie, to Mako’s knowledge, hasn’t worn that beat-up hoodie in months. The way she wears it off one shoulder is cute in a disheveled way, and her shirt obviously hangs much differently than he’s used to seeing.

He sighs softly as he hands the phone back to Tracer. “Cute,” he says. He would love to snuggle or fuck her like that, but he keeps the internal commentary to himself.

“Yeah, I think so too.” Instead of letting the conversation continue, she heads to to the other end of the bar, where a new patron has shown up; he’s left alone with his drink.

Which is fine.

He needs some time to himself and his thoughts anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel and Ren for supporting me this month! Extra thanks to Muppet for doing some additional beta-ing for me.
> 
> Find me on Tumblr [here!](http://murasakidoku.tumblr.com/)


	12. XII

It’s been a few days of going to work in the day, then training at night. It’s kept him busy, and most importantly, kept him from moping about not having Jamie around.

Today has a rough start. As soon as Mako steps into the library, he’s slammed up against the wall by Zarya with rage in her eyes, her forearm against his shoulder.

“ _Where_ is Jamison, Rutledge?”

He stares down at her, shocked by the sudden show of aggression. Zarya’s strength was always obviously present, but she never used it against people; she had enough charisma to get people to shove off with words alone. To so easily physically push around a man of his size and stature --albeit off-guard--is nothing to scoff at.

She leans closer, glaring daggers at him. “ _Where_ is _Jamison?_ None of us have heard or seen him since Christmas, which means _you are_ the last person to see him. You have been acting weird since that day.”

Mako holds up his hands defensively. “I know, I know. I should’ve told you sooner.”

Zarya backs off and lets him go, but she’s still glaring at him. “Explain yourself.”

“There was an accident,” he says. Zarya’s expression immediately drops to one of shock. “He got hurt.”

It doesn’t feel like much of a lie; it’s really just the oversimplification of the situation without going into too much detail that a layperson probably shouldn’t know in the first place.

“Is he okay?” she asks.

“That’s what they tell me,” he answers honestly. “I don’t know the whole story.”

Zarya turns away, muttering a Russian curse under her breath. “I am sorry, Mako,” she says, looking back up at him. “I know that he has some...brain things, so I was worried that something had happened between the two of you.”

Mako swallows self-consciously. “It’s alright.”

Zarya turns away and takes a seat at her workstation. He turns to look out the window behind him and glares at the dark and cloudy sky and silently commands it to clear up despite his mood. It’s a good thing that Melbourne already established itself as having unpredictable weather, or things might look suspicious.

His concentration is broken when he feels his phone vibrate against his chest and he pulls it out, figuring it would be the when and where of tonight’s training.

**Sombra**

_09:05_

The girls have decided to take the night off, but I’ve got materials for a project that I want you to work on. When can I deliver it?

**Mako**

_09:06_

This one won’t make me throw up, will it?

**Sombra**

_09:06_

Oh, Mako.

You know Pharah doesn’t hold it against you.

**Mako**

_09:10_

You sure?

I’d hold it against a bloke if he just shared his chunder with me.

**Sombra**

_09:10_

You sound like Jamie.

We figured you could use a break to rest, given what happened last night.

But no, it won’t make you throw up.

Unless you have some allergy to infernal plant life and decide to eat it.

**Mako**

_9:46_

A plant…? Huh.

I get off at 5 tonight, you can swing by anytime after that.

**Sombra**

_9:46_

I’ll be there at 6.

Work is otherwise uneventful. It’s funny, because before Jamie came into his life, an eventful day would be compromised of dealing with a patron’s obvious fetish for asian women by standing just inside his personal space until he left, or helping small children find the books they’re looking for. Now, it just feels mind-numbing and samey. It’s weird because this is what he _wanted_ ; this is the lifestyle he sought when he came back down under, and the monotony was able to get away undetected until Jamie was no longer regularly visiting in order to shake things up.

After Mako clocks out for the day and pulls the protective sheet off of his bike to go home, he folds it up and stares at her for a while. He tucks in the sheet into the saddle bag on her side, then reaches out to run his fingers along the tusks fastened to the headlight, every inch of aged ivory actually painstakingly painted metal, every minute detail by hand. _Razorback_ was meant to only be a souvenir from his life of an aft-called hero who only accepted credit for his work anonymously. Now, every time he sees her, it stokes the reignited fire of _purpose_ inside of him, and it makes him restless and his fingers twitchy. He desperately wants to feel the ache in his arms and back again from the strain of riding.

If only he wasn’t expecting company later tonight…

He runs his hand over the artificially distressed gas tank before he settles into her seat, causing her to sink with his weight. He turns over the engine and gives her a few aggressive revs to announce himself to the world that this won’t bring him down.

_If Jamie comes back..._

Mako frowns at himself. No.

 _When_ _Jamie comes back, I’m taking him on a long road trip. Maybe up to the Gold Coast. I bet he’d like that._

With one more rev he takes off for home.

Even though Mako is expecting company, he gets stripped down to just a tank and shorts for the rest of the evening. At one point, Pharah sends him a text asking him when his next day off is, because they should probably make a day of trying to master gravity manipulation. Next Wednesday, two days from now, he tells her, and then he tries to get lost in some design work.

He doesn’t realise how much time passes before there’s a knock on his door at exactly 6 o’clock. Mako pushes his computer chair back to stand up, then moves to the door to let Sombra in.

“Huh,” she says, looking around the place. “You keep a tidy place even when you’re moping.”

“Not like keeping it trashed makes me feel any better,” he returns. “You want anything to drink?”

She holds up a hand. “No, _gracias--_ I’m only here to drop off your project.” With a mild flourish, she pulls her hand out from behind her back and presents a small clay flower pot, full of pitch-black soil with sparsely spread, small particles that shimmer in the light. A sprout is breaking out from the soil in the middle of it--a seemingly normal, fleshy green thing that doesn’t seem at all as if it’s not from this world.

Mako takes it from her and brings it up to his face to see if maybe he’s missing something.

“In our tongue,” she begins, “we call it the Demon’s Guilt. It’s a delicacy in Inferno, only ever cultivated by demons when they feel remorse for having done something to another demon. To offer a fully grown Demon’s Guilt is to offer a formal apology, and to drink from the flower means that the apology has been accepted.”

It doesn’t take long for Mako to figure out what it’s for. “This is an olive branch for Jamie.”

Sombra nods.

“It seems like an awfully...kindergarten-level project,” he says slowly, waiting for her to explain the catch.

“For a demon, maybe. But this little plant has been excised from its native environment; the soil it’s in will lose the magic power unless you keep feeding it your own. Feed it too much, and it will drown--feed it too little, and…” Sombra trails off, the end of the statement obvious, before continuing:

“The girls and I were talking about what kind of space Jamie’s head will be in when he comes back. You short-circuited his glamour because you were too strong for either of you to handle, and he’ll view you as a threat moving forward. Since he tends to be a little flighty, we can’t rely on him sticking around long enough for a demonstration. This is the fastest way to show him you’ve learned how to control yourself.”

Mako nods, then turns to lean over and gingerly place the plant on the table in front of his couch.

“Don’t fuck it up,” she warns. “It could be decades before we get our hands on another one.”

“No pressure,” he says, slightly exasperated, then stands back up to face her. “I’ll do my best.” 

“Oh, I almost forgot. Could you take your glasses off?”

Mako reaches up to satisfy her request, exposing his stitched-up eye to her. Sombra reaches up and swipes her thumb across his stitches and they fall from his face like weightless flakes. In an instant, Mako doesn’t feel the force keeping it shut any more, but he still hesitates before opening it, like the motion is foreign to him now.

He immediately shuts it, grunting when the light that hits his eye is too bright to handle. Sombra lets out an amused chuckle.

“Take it slow,” she instructs. He tries again, and even though the light is still too overstimulating, he manages to keep it open for her long enough to inspect it.

Having his eye back is weirder than he thought it would be. Everything is blurry, no matter how hard he tries to focus, and it messes with his other eye as he tries to get it to do so. In the end, he has to focus on only what he can see from his better eye, and when he decides that it’s the best option he finds alarmingly creased eyebrows on Sombra’s face.

“Something wrong?”

“I was expecting it to look different,” she explains, “but I don’t think we did it wrong…” Sombra looks past Mako to his bed and calls, “Moira?”

She jumps off his bed and trots over. Mako has quickly learned what it means when they say Moira comes and go as she pleases: she appears and disappears from his condo regularly, without him letting her in or out. He still hasn’t figured out how she does it.

Moira, once she has enough space to, stretches out her upper body across the floor, her claws creeping out of her paws as she draws back. Before Mako has the chance to complain about her tearing up his carpet, two portals are born in the wake of her scratching, as if she were ripping a hole not in his carpet, but in the fabric of reality itself. One of them is gold, radiant and blinding, and the other is red and purple like a gushing wound.

Out of the red one slithers a black-scaled snake staring up at him. It’s not just any plain snake--not with its long, needle-like teeth too long and angled to fit in its mouth, red eyes lacking any pupils, and spines running down its length. It is _Despair._ The other, he can only assume is also a snake by the way it moves, but he can’t make out any details. Looking at it is like staring directly into a fluorescent bulb: he can only make out the details when he looks away, the image burned into his eyes.

What it looks like, however, is unimportant, compared to the uncontrollable burst of cold fear that shoots through him. He steps backward and trips over himself, falling backward upon the floor.  It sends a rattle through the things on the table as he lands, and probably through the next couple condos as well.

“No, we did it right,” Sombra comments.

“What _is_ that thing?” he asks, panicked.

“An angel,” she answers flatly. “It is _Acceptance._ Don’t worry, it’s under Moira’s control.” She steps forward and offers a hand to help him up, as unlikely as it would seem to a normal person for a petite Hispanic woman to help up a quarter-ton man. He spends no time considering this, however, and he readily accepts her hand just as readily as she helps him to his feet without issue.

“I can’t see it that well,” he explains. “It’s just....a light.”

“Like one that might invite you to walk into it?” she asks with a knowing smirk on her face. He considers the description, then nods.

“Yeah, something like that.”

“The rest of them will look like that for a while until your vision gets stronger. You’ll have to practice pretending they’re not there.”

It’s going to be easier said than done, but he nods. The two snake-like creatures crawl back into their respective portals, and Mako lets out a sigh of relief.

“With that,” she says with finality, “I’ll leave you be for the rest of the night. Call me if you need anything, _Jefe._ ”

He nods in understanding and leads her out of the condo, wishing her a good night.

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

Mako stares up at the partially cloudy, bright blue sky, from his comfortable place laying on his back on the middle of the sidewalk. His chest heaves with laboured breathing and he’s sweating through his workout clothes.

His view of the sky is tunnelled by tall, narrow buildings. In the sweltering summer heat, they provide some level of comfort in the form of shade. This particular part of the city is quiet; the tall office buildings surrounding them are listed for sale, but are unlikely to actually be bought due to their age and lack of proximity to decent parking and major roads. Pharah, of course, doesn’t give a damn; her rented car is parked on the side of the road, some feet down from where they are. This is as close as you can come to a ghost town in Melbourne.

Soft footfalls approach him and he closes his eyes. Pharah looks down at him and kneels, uncapping a vial and waving it in front of Mako’s face. As the seconds pass, his breathing becomes a little less laboured.

“You’re definitely built for strength,” she observes, “not so much for speed or agility.”

“Not all of us can afford to be a skinny bitch,” he snaps back between breaths. Pharah chuckles and takes a seat on the sidewalk’s curb before taking a swig from her water bottle.

“All of the basics have come to me naturally,” he whines. “Why is this the one that keeps escaping me?”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself. We all have our unique aptitudes, and some of the basics come easier or harder depending on that.”

“How do I find out what my aptitude is?”

Pharah shrugs. “You’ll figure it out sooner or later. I mean--we both can control the weather, but for me it takes a lot of concentration, but you control it as if it were breathing. Your mother did the same. Sombra or my mother could try until they’re blue in the face and it’d never happen.”

“Sombra seems like the kind to avoid trying to keep up appearances,” Mako says, finally deciding to peel himself off the concrete and sit up. Pharah offers him water and he takes it to down a large swig.

“I wouldn’t say that,” she says. “Sombra knows how to loosen up when she’s comfortable. Come on,” she says, nudging at his shoulder. “Let’s give it one more try and then we can take an actual break.” 

Mako groans but doesn’t actually protest as he pushes himself back up onto his feet. He takes a few lumbering strides to the other side of the road and lets out a sigh to balance himself. He concentrates on the pull of gravity upon his body, keeping him anchored to the earth, the sensation of its persistent grip. His attention turns to the building wall in front of him, and he imposes the same sensation upon it, as if it were new ground to plant his feet on. It grows until he can feel it practically pull at him so strongly that he has to fight against it to stand still.

Then, he runs towards the wall, building up as much speed as his bulky body can manage in the short distance. Once he gets up to it, he kicks off the ground and manages to run up the side of the building for a good couple feet before his momentum starts to die off as Earth starts to impose more and more of its natural gravity back on him. He gets about five metres up before he can’t fight it any longer and starts plummeting back toward the ground; with a flick of her hand, Pharah halts his fall and delicately places him back down on the ground without injury.

“You’re getting better,” she comments. It’s a while before he’s able to respond, too busy trying to catch his breath. By the time he responds, he’s almost forgotten what she’s referring to.

“If only it was as easy as growing that plant.”

“The Demon’s Guilt Sombra gave you?” Pharah asks.

“Yeah.”

“How’s it doing?”

“Fine. It flowered last night.”

There’s a long silence. Mako turns to her and finds her eyes wide with surprise.

“What? Already?” she asks.

“Uh...yeah? I spend my nights with it while listening to music. Did I do it wrong?”

Pharah doesn’t answer his question. After a stunned silence, she reaches into her pocket and pulls out her phone and feverishly starts to write a text message.

“...Pharah?”

No response; she focuses so intently on her texting that he’s convinced that she didn’t hear his question. Whatever that message is, it’s urgent -- so he just stands there awkwardly, watching her participate in a conversation he’s not a part of. 

“I think I just figured out your aptitude,” she says. It’s not a direct answer to his question, but he reads between the lines. After a moment of silence, her phone buzzes, and she stands up.

“Change of plans,” she declares, and stands up. “We’ll put off gravity training for now. I want to try something different.”

“Alright,” he says slowly, then stands to follow her to the car park that she left her car in. 

When they get into her car, they immediately take off to the east. Mako can only stand about ten minutes of driving before he can’t swallow down the urge to ask “Where are we going?” any longer.

“The zoo,” Pharah responds.

Mako stares at her. “The _zoo_? Like _this_? Can’t we go home and change first?”

“Why?”

“What do you mean, _why? You're_ not the person that gets looked at as the fat guy that just rolled off his couch.” He holds out his arms. “I’m wearing nothing but a ratty tank top, shorts, and ten layers of beading sweat. My hair is matted and tangled and I’m sure the body odour is about to kick in any minute now.”

Pharah’s eyes practically twinkle with amusement. “Oh, don't be such a big baby. Plenty of people there will only have put in a quarter as much effort into their appearance as you have.”

Mako glares at her. It's the first time someone's dared to call him a _big baby_ since he finished his growth spurt. Now, with the top of his head firmly pressed against the roof of this mid-sized van, a woman that is just flirting with six foot dares to call him infantile names.

Must be a witch thing.

Mako reaches over for the steering wheel to take control of the situation, but Pharah smacks it away with an alarming about of strength. Even though she just swatted him, it impulse feels like she straight-up slugged the side of his hand with inhuman strength. He pulls it back, shaking the shock out of it.

“We'll be there for ten, maybe twenty minutes. Tops. It'll be less time than it takes to get back to your flat.”

Mako sighs in defeat. “Fine,” he grunts out. “Ten minutes.”

He pulls out his phone while he waits for them to get to their destination. Out of mechanical habit, he pulls up his conversation with Jamie to continue whatever topic they were on or move on to the next one.

**Mako**

_16:26 Dec 24 2021_

Should I bring anything?

**Jamie**

_16:44 Dec 24 2021_

You’ll probably want to bring some vejjo-friendly stuff

There will probably be some but not a whole lot?

**Mako**

_16:50 Dec 24 2021_

Good call. I’ll pick some up and I’ll be home in twenty.

**Jamie**

_16:52 Dec 24 2021_

Okie dokie! <3

Mako sighs to himself. It’s not like he has either option; Jamie’s phone is still plugged in and laying on top of his CPAP at home. But maybe sending something will make him feel better anyway by giving him the illusion that his boyfriend is out there receiving his texts.

**Mako**

_10:31 Jan 3 2022_

I miss you.

Wherever you are, I hope you’re okay.

I’m sorry about what I did to you.

I hope you’re not mad at me.

I’m making sure that it’ll never happen again…

I don’t want to hurt you.

Ever.

Please come back safe and sound.

“Who are you texting?” Pharah asks. Mako closes the messaging app and decides to pull up a game instead.

“No one,” he responds.

“You sure?” she asks. “Getting a bit overcast.”

For anyone else, those two statements would seem unrelated. Mako leans forward so he can give himself clearance to look up at the sky; sure enough, clouds are starting to drift in.

“Could use some shade anyway,” he dismisses, sitting back into his chair. “It’s nearly forty degrees.”

“Fair enough. May as well add a cooler breeze.”

Mako scoffs. “Any other requests?”

“A light drizzle in the late evening would be nice.”

Mako rolls his eyes at the idea that his powers are being talked about so lightly, but maybe that’s what he should come to expect now. Now that he’s had a few days with it, it comes as easily as breathing: it does it by itself, but he can consciously take control of it when he wants to. With something that comes so naturally comes to him, he might as well make light of it...right?

“Pharah?” he asks, putting down his phone.

“Yes?”

“Why wasn’t it always this way? I was a pretty imaginative and emotional kid. I would’ve run across these talents back then, with how easily they come to me.”

“You have Jamie to thank for that,” she answers. “All Greater Sins put out this sort of…” Pharah gestures vaguely with a single hand. “...magical miasma. And he’s been living with you for several months now, right?”

Mako shrugs. “He spends more time at my place than he does at his student housing these days,” he admits.

“You’ve been soaking up his magic byproduct this whole time, making you stronger by the day. That’s why you broke his glamour.”

Mako considers this for a moment before responding, “I didn’t know my own strength.”

Pharah laughs. “That’s exactly it.” A beat, and she looks over at him while stopped at a red light: “But not anymore. You know what it feels like now.”

Mako nods. In just a few days, with the coven’s help, he’s learned the extents and the limits of his power; he knows how to identify it as it flows through him, knows when it comes easily, knows when it’s struggling. This must be the reason why Pharah so easily dropped the gravity combat training -- it may not be something he can pull off right now, but it was a worthwhile lesson learning what it feels like when it doesn’t come so easily.

Pharah finds a place in the carpark. It’s about as crowded as Mako expected on a Monday, which is to say that it’s not dead, but not quite flooded with people, either. Pharah purchases tickets for the both of them and Mako is clearly uncomfortable with the attention he immediately gets once they walk through the gate.

“Hey,” she says, giving him a gentle nudge. “Just focus on the animals, okay? Don’t give them any mind.”

Mako grumbles. “Easier said than done,” but he tries. The two of them make for a slow walk around the different exhibits, and Pharah offers very little conversation. She seems more focused on looking around, as if trying to find something, and spends very little time stopping to take in the views...until the meerkat section. No other people are here, because the exhibit is completely empty, not a single meerkat in sight, but she comes to a full stop in front of the glass. Mako stands behind her, looking out at the dune-laden environment.

“Shame the meerkats aren’t out,” she says quietly, clearly intending that Mako is her sole audience. She turns her head to look up at him. “Think you might be able to do something about that…?”

He arches his brow at her. What does she _expect_ him to do? _It’s up to interpretation, as always,_ he thinks to himself, and takes a half-step closer to the glass.

At first, he simply tries to will them to show up by virtue of simply wanting it. Then, after a few seconds, he tries something a little more bargaining: _Anyone home?_ He asks in his mind. _Just wanted to say hi._

Still nothing. Mako places his hand on the glass and as he tries to come up with other ideas, a single head pops up over the edge of a dune and looks directly at him. Then a second, then a third, then a fourth -- the entire meerkat family spills out of their den and with caution, approach the glass in front of Mako as a group. Mako kneels down to get closer to their level.

“Can you hear them?” Pharah asks quietly.

Mako concentrates and tries to find any presence in his mind that isn’t his own. He can hear some kind of murmuring, a chittering much like the noise meerkats usually make, but while it’s definitely conversational in nature, he can’t quite make out what they’re saying.

“I can hear them,” he answers, “but I can’t make out what they’re saying.”

“Try thinking about it less literally. They don’t know your language, but you might know theirs.”

After a thoughtful hum, he tries to focus less on _words_ and more their _feeling._ Moments of silence pass. The lack of commentary from Mako makes it seem as if he’s making some sort of headway; Pharah waits for a few more minutes before calling out, “Mako?”

“They just had pups,” he says. “Their vets can’t figure out why one of them is sick. It’s the food.”

Pharah blinks. “Are you sure?”

“Willing to stake my life on it.”

Pharah nods and pulls out her phone. She texts a message to Sombra as Mako stands back up. Some zoo guests have noticed the reappearance of the meerkats and have joined in front of the glass to see them better. Mako feels a bit awkward to leave without assuring them that they’ll take care of it, but he derails his own thought when he realises that he said he’d _stake his life_ for the sake of a couple of creatures that he’d only known for a few seconds.

“Sombra will handle it from here,” Pharah says. “We got what we came here for.”

Mako almost half-wants to stay and try to converse with other animals, but nothing is going to change the fact that he’s immensely uncomfortable in his current getup. Ultimately, he doesn’t complain as Pharah leads him back out the gate, and to his relief, back to his condo.

He can’t help but notice how much Pharah’s phone is blowing up with notifications, but he tries his best to ignore it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel, Ren, Woden's Skadi, Zalanye, and Muppet for supporting me this month!
> 
> Find me on Tumblr [here](http://murasakidoku.tumblr.com/)!


	13. XIII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quick word of caution: this chapter brings up the topics of transgender and nonbinary gender and may trigger dysphoria in certain individuals. The demons of Inferno are solely and narrowly concerned only with physical sex rather than gender identity and this is **not** a representation of my personal stance on gender.
> 
> If you would like to avoid this content, skip the second of the three parts this chapter is divided into. The sections are separated by this line:
> 
> \-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
> 
> Be safe, and remember to love yourself for who you are.

 

A _Lilin_ wakes up tangled in two other bodies.

He rouses to the sound of a single, melodic _ding_ and he becomes aware of the melodious thrum of singing bowls. He opens his eyes slowly, drowsily, and all he can really make out is a shoulder covered in brilliant, iridescent green scales. There’s something familiar about them, something comforting about their presence, and he lets his eyes fall shut once again.

“Sensei,” he hears over his head, whispered and hushed yet excited. “I think he woke up.”

“Let him rest,” a deeper, calmer voice replies. Another _ding_ fills the room, immediately followed by another higher-pitched _ding._ “We do not want to startle him.”

_Startle_ him? What an odd sentiment. He’s awash with a calmness that seems so foreign as to be almost _forced_ upon him, but it’s so potent that he doesn’t care. With his eyes still closed, he takes a mental inventory of his space. He’s lying on his side, sandwiched between two others. The green-scaled, more youthful-sounding entity lays on his own side, facing the _Lilin,_ his chin resting atop his head, arms around his waist. The other, wiser-sounding one, lays on what he assumes is their side as well, their face pressed against his shoulder. Countless hands wander the _Lilin_ ’s flesh, sending waves of peaceful sensations through his body. His legs are tangled with theirs, unable to tell where one begins and one ends.

_Ding._

The _Lilin_ opens his eyes for longer this time, and tilts his head up so that maybe he could see the younger entity a little better. He detects this and leans back enough, looking down until the _Lilin_ can take in his visage: a youthful face, reminiscent of mortals from the region known as Japan. His hair is shock-green, while his eyes look like different colours of inset green jade. He has no ears, just backward-fanning spines, long, wispy whiskers that float in the air behind them, and a set of short, simply-branched antlers.

“Yo,” he greets, grinning ear to ear, as if the _Lilin_ waking up had been the best development in millennia.

“Hi,” the _Lilin_ responds.

“How are you feeling?” he asks with a heavy accent.

The _Lilin_ deliberates for a moment before deciding to answer with, “Rested.” He whispers, feeling it necessary to do so even though he’s not sure why. A beat, then: “Where am I?”

“You’re in Sanctuary,” the other demon answers simply. “Do you remember who you are?”

_Who I am?_ What a weird question. Does anyone really forget who they are? “ _Lilin,_ ” he responds.

The other shakes his head. “No, that is _what_ you are. Do you remember your chosen name?”

His gut sinks. He has a chosen name? There’s very few reasons why he would have one, and most of them aren’t good. “No… I’m sorry.”

The joy on his face falters. The voice behind him speaks up: “It is alright, Genji. He will remember with time.” Some rustling later, the body behind him moves away. “Come. Let us get some fresh air and food.”

The demon in front of him gets up and holds out a hand to help the _Lilin_ to his feet. He reaches out and takes it, but finds that the balance that holds him upright isn’t exactly what he expects it to be. He looks down but only sees the red and gold monastery robe he’s been dressed in, then reaches down with his free hand to realise that he _has_ no free hand, just a stump that ends a few inches past his elbow.

The hand that the other demon is holding is yanked away so he can use it to hike up enough fabric to find the comma-shaped prosthetic leg attached to him.

A cold sweat flushes over him. He feels his body attempt to breathe but air doesn’t get any farther than past his nose, and his heart beats against his chest like a frantic hammer against a too-tight drum. He casts his wide-blown eyes to the side as he sways his tail into his line of sight and spots two rectangular notches in the spade.

He swallows, and it feels like needles.

“I’m Fallen,” he whispers in fear, with the stagnant air in his lungs.

A hand places itself on his bare shoulder. He turns to look at its source with adamant terror in his eyes and finds...an angel.

His face is shaped like what a human’s would be if they didn’t have a lower jaw; while devoid of a mouth or nose, his face sports a three-by-three grid of eyes that are nothing but red, his hairless head ornate with circuit-like gold patterns. He has four sets of arms, but an otherwise humanoid body.

“You are among friends here,” the angel says, and a calming pulse echoes through his body. It wards off the panic, and there’s an empty clarity that overcomes his mind. He says the first thing that comes to mind after that:

“Jamison Fawkes.”

Both the demon and angel perk up at the name. He continues:

“I’m twenty-five years old. I’m a dual major in engineering and chemistry at the University of Melbourne and I work at a sushi restaurant.”

The other two look at each other, but only the demon has a visible grin. The angel’s smile is only visible in his eyes.

“How did I end up here..?” he asks.

“We were hoping you would tell us,” the demon responds.

“You simply showed up on our doorstep having lost your Self and dehydrated from what must have been a very long trip,” the angel follows.

Jamie scratches his head thoughtfully, but nothing comes to mind. “Maybe some of that food would jog my memory?” he asks, somewhat sheepishly.

“Of course. Follow us,” the angel instructs, and the two take off with Jamie in tow.

Outside the sanctum, the crisp Himalayan air hits Jamie. He takes in a deep breath of the clean air and lets it send a reinvigorating jolt through him as he takes in the view of tall, snow-capped mountains surrounding Sanctuary on all sides. A latticework grid in the distance protects the safe haven from the world outside, barely perceptible from how far away they are.

The monastery of Sanctuary itself is situated against the side of a tall mountain, providing a breathtaking view of the large village that consumes the foothills below. Even up here, you can see the bustling roads: the town is a diverse mishmash of angels, demons, and humans -- the latter of which are usually disabled or Touched: humans that have been affected, in some degree, by the cosmic war, granting them with abilities or perceptions that make life amongst normal humans impossible. Sanctuary is, as the name suggests, a refuge for all, and the only place on Earth where all of these beings coexist in peace.

It’s like coming home for Jamie. He didn’t think about this place a lot in recent days, but walking through familiar walkways an overhangs, taking in precious views and seeing the very same angels and demons that would be at each others’ throats in any other context jogs pleasant memories from coming into his own identity...and the friends he made in the process.

“ _Tatsu,_ ” Jamie says as they pass by long walkways and arched bridges. The demon turns his head to look at Jamie. “Shimada Genji, betrayed by his brother in his bid for power, now a groundskeeper of Sanctuary.

“ _Transcendence,_ ” he adds, looking at the angel who does not return the glance. “Tekhartha Zenyatta, cast from Paradiso for promoting humans to pursue their spiritual ideals, and mentor of all Exiled.”

“You remember us,” Zenyatta comments with a subtle, pleasant surprise in his voice.

“It’s coming back to me in pieces,” he admits.

They get to a large temple in the centre of the complex and sit at a long, low wooden table. They sit on the floor and after some time, a human monk comes by to place a large, shallow bowl full of Infernal and Paradisal fruits and vegetables, along with rice and some meat, all of which have been minimally modified outside of being simply cooked. Jamie digs in with vigour, eating half of the contents of the fruit bowl all by himself and pounding down a pitcher and half of water.

Once he’s finally full, he sits back and rubs his stomach. “I feel like that’s the first time I’ve eaten in ages…”

“It has been,” Zenyatta says. “If you flew here all the way from Melbourne, that’s at least twenty-four hours...on top of the four days you’ve been here, this is your first proper meal in five days.”

“I’ve been out for _four days?_ ”

“We had to put you under the effects of Blackthistle,” Genji shrugs. “You had enough will left over to bring yourself here, but without your Self and in a panic attack, we had to put you down due to how much of a threat you were to yourself and everyone here.”

Jamie bites his lip. He remembers none of it. “...I’m sorry,” he murmurs.

Zenyatta waves dismissively. “No apologies are needed. It seemed to be a case out of your control.”

“You had been overloaded,” Genji explains. “Too much energy to function properly. With a less inexperienced _Lilin_ it would make more sense, but for you? It was hard to believe. We had to provide tactile therapy for hours to get you back to baseline.”

_Overloaded,_ huh? Jamie rubs at his chin. Genji is right -- it’s hard to fathom what could cause an experienced _Lilin_ to take on more libido energy than he could handle. It’s a rookie mistake for sure, so it’s hard to imagine any scenarios where it’d happen to him. Alas, the train of thought leaves him still empty-handed. As his brain turns over the most recent memories he can muster, his eyes wander the dining hall. It provides a sudden distraction as he recalls memories from his last stay here.

“It’s a lot less busy than it used to be,” he comments. Right now, there’s about a dozen angels and demons eating meals or studying, along with a few human companions; this place used to leave standing room only, especially during mealtime.

“We were taking on more Fallen faster than we could grow the monastery,” Zenyatta says. “We had to change our mentality from being a permanent shelter to educating and rehabilitating, so that exiles can live out fulfilling lives among the humans.” The angel shrugs. “You could say that your successful integration inspired our change of mind.”

“Huh.” Jamie turns to Genji with a grin. “It must have been difficult to accept parting ways with your...collection of vagabonds.”

Genji chuckles. “No more than it is for you to be turned down for sex,” he says with a dismissive wave. “I could use my powers and make them stay, but that isn’t the point, is it? We’re stuck on Earth now. Living a healthy life here is about finding ways to sustain our vices without betraying those we share this planet with.”

“He’s started collecting booze,” Zenyatta interrupts. “And currencies from around the world.”

“And Sanctuary itself,” Genji adds. “And none of them would ever complain about being ‘mine’.”

Jamie lets out a lighthearted giggle. “You’re in better spirits than when I was last here.” He pushes himself up to stand and the others watch him curiously. “I’m going to take a walk around the perimeter, see if it jogs any memories. Meet you guys back in the rest sanctum, ey?”

They nod, and Jamie takes off.

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

Jamie is laying down in the bedchamber of Sanctuary trying to fall asleep when it hits him.

There was something off about his orgasm, a shudder that drove up his spine, that felt more like muscle spasms than the pleasurable tingle of climax as his glamour was overloaded and his real body was forcefully yanked from Purgatorio into the mortal realm. 

_“--I’m not scared,” Mako says, placatively holding out his hands as Jamie’s heel digs into the bed, fruitlessly trying to get himself further away from the situation. “You don’t need to be worried, I’m not scared,” he repeats. “I always knew.”_

No need to be worried? Did Mako take him for a fool, a freshly exiled demon who didn’t truly understand what a permanent life in the mortal realm meant? What dangers there were out there for a demon of his caliber?

Mako had been a witch this entire time and never told him. Never told him he could see what Jamie actually was. Lead him on to believe the fantasy that both of them were just normal human beings.

It stings like a pain he’s never known, including being dismembered. He sobs as quietly as possible amongst the sleeping demons and angels surrounding him, turning over to his front and curling into a ball as he beats a fist against the ground, hot tears streaming down his face with anguish for having been tricked into feeling such love for someone who only wanted to take advantage of him.

It’s almost embarrassing to think about how much time Jamie spent searching for love-- _true_ , star-crossed love, where it came as much as it went, and when he finally finds it, it turns out to be a sham. Mako used his being male to go completely under the radar and catch a compromised demon.

And he was _so_ good at it, too.

A few days later, Jamie finds himself in the monastery’s Blackthistle field. He comes to gather some crop to busy himself and meditate with the relaxing effects of the Infernal herb. He hates being angry, it feels unnatural and uncomfortable, and he’s not willing to talk to anyone about it. He was _hoping_ the field would be empty, but it’s already occupied by an odd angel: one with a husky horse-like lower body made of ivory-like skin jointed like a machine, and then the upper body of a bulky human. She has sweeping horns at the sides of her head that almost remind Jamie of his own, if they didn’t look like they were smooth geodes. She’s mouthless, with eyes like the lenses of flashlights.

“Oh, hello!” she greets, waving at him as he approaches.

“G’day,” he responds slowly, unsure what to make of this meeting. “Who are you?”

“I have chosen to go by the name Orisa.” She’s new to exile; he can tell by the way she talks. “I am _Erudition._ ”

“Never met _Erudition_ before. Cherubim?”

“No. I am a Virtue. Or...perhaps I should say that I was.”

Jamie lets out a noise of acknowledgement, then takes a seat next to her in the rows of Blackthistle crop.

“What are you?” she asks, her head tilted to the side with curiosity.

“ _Lilin,_ ” he answers. “I go by Jamie.”

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Jamie,” she responds. He gives her an awkward smile; the conversation feels awkward, but it’ll come to her in time. Angels aren’t used to speaking, and especially in any language not Enochian. “You are a Greater Sin of Lust. Is that correct?”

“Yeah, that’s right.” He looks down at the basket beside her and balks at what he sees in it: there’s a half-dozen Blackthistle blossoms -- or at least half-dozen to the best of his recognition -- but they’re terribly torn up. They’re definitely usable, but a lot of the nectar is getting wasted as they bleed into the basket. “Is this your assignment today?”

“Yes. However, I am having great difficulty in accomplishing what I was taught. I have not grasped the technique…”

“That’s alright. Can you show me how you’ve been doing it?”

Orisa demonstrates the technique where her hand hovers over the plant and her fingers come up under the thistle bulb to pull upward. He can immediately see that she hasn’t developed the fine motor skills to avoid putting too much pressure on the flower in the process.

“Let’s try something different,” he says, as it pops off the plant when it can’t take the pressure any longer. “I can’t demonstrate it because I only have one arm, though. Can I move your hands?”

Orisa holds her hands out in front of her and he navigates her hands and fingers so that she’s pinching the stem just below the bulb between thumbs and forefingers.

“Now try twisting one in clockwise, the other counterclockwise.”

She does nothing. Jamie raises an eyebrow.

“What’s wrong?”

“I do not know the words ‘clockwise’ and ‘counterclockwise’.”

Jamie opens his mouth to say something, then closes it. Many years ago, he, too, did not know what a clock was. “It’s a fancy human way of saying ‘turn left’ and ‘turn right’.”

“Oh, I see!”

An like that, the thistle bulb and flower pops off and lands on the ground. Some of them may bruise like that, but that’s for the extractor to worry about. “There ya go!”

Her flashlight-like eyes slant to give her the appearance of a smile. “Hooray!” she says, with as much emotion as an angel can muster. “This procedure will make this task much more efficient. I thank you for your help, Jamie.”

“No worries, mate.”

Jamie joins Orisa in harvesting Blackthistle bulbs; he uses a technique he’d developed on his own, decades ago out of boredom and the appeal of a challenge. He didn’t realise it when he was on his way here, but the company is a welcome distraction from his emotions. After a few moments of comfortable silence, he finally asks “So, what did you get exiled for?”

“My task was to Harvest,” she answers, “They were human children. I was supposed to act through a mad human. However, the school-bound vehicle performed a turn at a velocity that it was not built for, as one of the children took the responsibility of operation while the adult in charge of them was trying to defend the children from their attacker. I should have let the vehicle tumble down the cliffside, as the means of Harvest are inconsequential, but I found myself compelled to stop its fall.”

“You saved them,” Jamie says. Orisa nods. “Do you regret it?”

“No. Even with the knowledge that this would happen to me, I would do it just the same if I had to do it over again. Although our task is to Harvest, I found it much more fulfilling to see them experience relief and gratitude.” She turns to him. “What was your case?”

Jamie hesitates. “...I’m told that I fell in love,” he answers, then swings his tail into her line of sight. “These notches represent me and the one I fell in love with. But they excised most of my memories from me after my trial, so I don’t remember anything of it.”

“Love?” she asks; her curiosity is clear in her tone, as if it comes naturally to her. “What is it like to be in love?”

Jamie’s mind immediately thinks of Mako. He thinks of all the time they’d spent together, either out in public or sharing a quiet evening, eating meals together, watching cartoons, sharing bud. His own high-pitched titter the treble to Mako’s bassy chuckle. The conversations they had without words, just their touch and the atmosphere. Star-gazing off of his balcony.

The betrayal.

Jamie frowns. He really doesn’t want to get into it. “It’s hard to explain.”

“Please try your best,” Orisa pleads. “It is in my nature to learn.”

He looks up at her. All he can think to say is _it’s the best feeling in the world,_ but while he mulls over what he could possibly say, a female voice chimes in behind them, and they both turn to look at her.

“It’s when beings find a companionship with each other that makes them feel more complete than when they’re by themselves. It’s like friendship, but it leaves a hole when the other isn’t around.”

Jamie turns away, scowling, to return to picking thistle.

“To be in love sounds like a very pleasant sensation,” Orisa comments, unaware of Jamie’s mood. The woman nods, then turns to Jamie. “Happy New Year, Jamison. I apologise for not visiting you sooner; I’ve been very busy.”

“It’s alright, Angela,” he mutters. “Happy New Year.”

“Would you mind accompanying me?” she asks. “We have much to catch up on.”

Jamie glances at Orisa and sighs defeatedly. He knows Angela well enough to know that she'll just wait until later if he brushes her off, and he's not going to reckon that part of her has changed at all since he was last here. He stands up and brushes his rear off with his hand, carefully navigating the crop to meet Angela at the edge of it.

“You're looking so well,” she comments, reaching well above her head to sink her hands in the hair between his horns. He bows his head forward slightly to make it easier for her. “Looking healthier every time I see you. Still living down under, I hear.”

“Yeah.”

She lets go of him and starts walking down the sculpted pathway away from the gardens. He follows by her side. “How's it treating you?”

“It's fine,” he answers shortly. Angela arches a brow at him, and she figures that she may as well stop attempting to break the ice and get to the point. 

“I heard you found yourself a nice boyfriend,” she says.

Jamie stares at the ground and picks idly at the single sleeve of his robe that conveniently hides his stump arm. He doesn’t respond; he only pouts.

“...and that the two of you had a little bit of a conflict. That’s why you came here.”

“I don’t really want ta talk about it.”

“That’s all right. We can just walk. Just keep in mind that I am here for you.”

He nods solemnly. She leads the way and he stays by her side. Their walk is quiet, without much conversation, as they weave a path through the monastery, passing arched bridges and wide, clear spaces meant for practicing martial arts, where demons and angels alike practice under the tutelage of an elder human. Another is filled with all sorts of beings meditating together to the sound of singing bowls and gongs. They pass by acres designated for farming infernal and paradisal vegetation and flocks of domesticated animals and their lesser indulgence kin. 

They get all the way into town, where the concentration of humans are far denser than in the temple. The smell of Nepalese food drifts from different buildings, some decorated in the wares they offer for sale. Humans of varying ailments, some visible and some not, wander to and fro, hardly minding the angels and demons walking amongst them without any effort to hide their identity.

Angela stops in front of a restaurant and turns to Jamie to ask if he's hungry. He offers her a shrug; he could go either way. They walk in and have a seat, where a gleeful old woman with a severe forward slouch takes their order. While they wait for their food, Jamie idly picks at his sleeve while Angela works on something on her tablet.

“I thought I had found it,” he finally says, his voice quiet in the empty sitting area.

“Found what?” she asks, looking up from her tablet.

“That feeling I've been chasing ever since I became Fallen,” he says, unable to lift his eyes from his sleeve to make eye contact.

“Love?” She asks.

“Yeah. It seems so strange to me, that humans can find their soulmate in their short lives, and it's taken me...centuries.”

“I think it happens less than it seems,” she offers. “I think a lot of people end up settling for second best, or for a circumstance that suits their needs outside of romance. Not that there's anything wrong with that.”

“I'm starting to think it's a sham. Like it's only meant to be something that lasts for a passing moment… Instead of enjoying a permanent, fulfilling companionship…” he finally looks up at her. “As you put it.”

“You wouldn't be able to find that kind of companionship in normal humans,” she suggests, fully aware that she's playing devil's advocate. “They would only be in your life for a few fleeting moments, until they expired.”

“I know,” he breathes out. “But it's not like it matters now, since he wasn't a normal human after all…”

Angela rests her chin in her hand as she looks at him. “That's the most curious thing of it all. What makes you think that a man managed to become a witch?”

“Oh, please.” He scowls. “Everyone acts like it's impossible, but you know it's not.”

“Name a few for me, I must have forgotten.”

Jamie opens his mouth to say a name, but before it even gets out, Angela interrupts with: _“Pacted_ witches.”

Jamie closes his mouth and stares at her, then finally offers a name. “Alex Edwards, Witch of Mind.”

“Made a pact before he transitioned,” Angela corrects. “Nothing in the clause of a pact states that a witch can't change her identity after the fact.”

“Lehua, Witch of Fertility.”

“He's mahu, Jamie. Third genders count as long as they can or once could menstruate with the cycle of the moon.”

Jamie huffs out a frustrated sigh. He could name off a few more, but none of them fall out of the category she just defined. “Fine. You win.”

“I'm not trying to win anything, Jamie. I'm just trying to make a point.”

“Yeah?” He asks aggressively. “And what point is that?”

“This situation may not be what you think it is.”

Their conversation is briefly interrupted as their food is brought and placed in front of them. Angela begins eating without any hesitation, but Jamie is too busy glaring at her to dig in.

“Then what do you think it is?” he asks.

After swallowing her current bite, she answers, “In all honesty, I don’t know. I was going to suggest that you meet with Amélie for some insight.”

Jamie’s knit brows invert, immediately shooting up in surprise. “You’ve gotta be joking. Surely she has better things to concern herself with than some demon’s love life.”

“You may be surprised.”

Jamie picks at his food indecisively. Amélie the Seer is, like Angela, an oddity in the cosmic war. Angela realised that she had the potential to become a pacted witch some time after receiving her medical license in Switzerland, but wouldn’t budge on her stance on the hippocratic oath that she had taken--refusing to sacrifice an angel as an offering to find a Queen. 

Amélie, in a way, was similar: her husband was a Priest, though his close proximity to Angels had slowly driven him to madness and became convinced that his wife should become a Priest as well. Through coercion and omission of the truth, she had been given the ability to see angels, but found the truth too much a burden to handle. She ended up murdering her husband and cutting out her own eyes so that she wouldn’t have to bear witness to angels any longer. Since she had been Touched, however, she had ended up only trading in her physical sight in exchange for an omniscient perception beyond human understanding.

Jamie has been told that she was once warm and friendly, but what happened made her cold and aloof, and Jamie’s sometimes uncontrollable friendliness landed him in the doghouse with her multiple times. But that was years ago...perhaps she’s forgiven him, or at least moved on, by now.

“Suppose I could,” he finally says, after getting halfway through his meal and silently debating with himself the whole time. “Do you know when she’d be available?”

“When I briefed her on the situation, she seemed interested enough to drop whatever she was doing at the time. You could probably just walk in and have a chat.”

“Guess I’ll have to take your word for it,” he says, still half-doubting this plan.

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

It’s evening of the same day when Jamie works up the courage to go see Amélie. She lives at the top of one of the towers overlooking the urban part of Sanctuary, which means it’s a steep climb up stone stairs to get to her. The chamber is pitch black when he pulls back the curtain separating her room from the rest of the building. It’s as silent as it is dark, and if he didn’t know any better, he would assume this room was empty. Only by the dim glow that his eyes naturally put out can he see enough not to run into anything.

He takes a few steps inside, letting the curtain close behind him. A soft chuckle, followed a French-accented voice, comes from some distance ahead of him.

“I would recognise those uneven footfalls anywhere.”

From above him, a spider the size of his head lowers itself down from its own silky string. It comes as no shock to Jamie, who holds out his hand for the ten-legged demon to stand on. He’s always had a kinship with _Voyeur,_ due to the shared domain of sin of Lust. The demon takes its offered seat, then uses the platform to crawl up onto Jamie’s shoulder. She kneads at Jamie’s neck with her fuzzy, warm pedipalps.

“G’day, Amélie…”

“ _Mes petites amours,_ ” she calls out gently, “would you put a light on for our guest?”

There’s a few seconds of silence that pass before the area becomes illuminated by the lamps fastened to the walls. Amélie is sitting a distance away in a chaise lounge, wrapped in a short-length silk robe that reads more like pyjamas than the monastery robe Jamie is wearing. In her hands is a novel in braille, her feet tangled up in a plush blanket. She was a woman who born into and made her own money, so she furnishes her living quarters with the creature comforts she had come to love in her life while enjoying the relative solitude of living amongst the disabled humans of Sanctuary. He envies her a little bit, not for her particular choice in circumstance but for the fact that she gets to enjoy the best of two worlds.

“I’m sorry,” he says, once he realises the context of her current attire. “I wouldn’t have come if I knew this was so late in the day for you.”

“It is quite all right.” Every syllable of her words is annunciated, intentional, as if calculated. “I had retired unusually early today. Come, help me make some tea.”

She stands and Jamie follows her to a kitchenette. Despite the luxury that Amélie surrounds herself in, there are visible cobwebs almost everywhere, but they’re strategically placed around objects rather than haphazardly slung to catch prey. In the corner of his eyes, he can see the little _Idle_ scurrying about: smaller, weaker Lesser Indulgences that look similar to _Voyeur,_ but move in swarms.

Jamie’s job is to fetch the ceramic mugs to be used for the tea. Amelie puts the water in the kettle and turns it on before pointing out to Jamie where the tea bags are.

“You are quieter than the last time we met,” she comments as he tears into the teabag's protective paper shells. “I hope you do not mind my appearance,” she adds, gesturing in the direction of her own face. 

Amelie had a remarkably beautiful face -- the kind you would see on fashion models: sharp features, ungodly symmetry. Her skin is pale as porcelain, contrasting with her long, silky black hair. The aged scars that dig their way through her eyeballs and eyelids mar what would be a face that most would kill to have; for vanity alone, she usually wears a headdress to keep that part of her face hidden.

“Not really,” he says, after giving her face a long consideration. “Kind of what I expected anyway.”

“Still feeling awkward from our last interaction then?”

He doesn't immediately respond, which makes her chuckle. “It's fine, Jamison. I've...mellowed out since you were last here.”

Jamie gives her an awkward smile. “Reckon you're still not a fan of hugs--”

“--No,” she immediately interjects. Jamie laughs despite himself. “I don't hold it against you. You are….a tactile being.”

He allows himself to relax a little. “Thanks.”

“Besides, it's been over two decades. What kind of person would I be to not forgive you by now?”

“It wouldn't have come as a surprise. We demons can hold grudges for eternities over the smallest things.”

The kettle makes a gentle click to indicate that it's gotten to temperature, and Jamie pushes the mugs and their awaiting teabags towards her. She hooks the first segment of her index finger over the edge of the mug, then pours the hot water into each one. 

“Speaking of which…”

Jamie gulps.

“...I hear that you may be upset with someone you've become close to.”

“Yeah.” He fidgets with his sleeve. “Angela told me you might help shed some, uh...light on the situation.”

“I will try,” she specifies. “Do you have any object that has been in his possession for a while?”

Jamie shakes his head. “No, I was completely naked when I came here. The closest thing I have to that is...well, me.”

“It'll have to do,” she shrugs. “Though it means I can only look at the situation through your eyes.” 

“Maybe that's for the best. At the very least, hopefully you can see what I missed.”

“We’ll do it over tea,” she offers. “Take our time with it.”

He nods, silently, and a second later remembers that she can't see it. “Yeah.”

After their cups are finished steeping, she hands one to Jamie and leaves the kitchenette area to sit on one of the cushions at a table full of books and odd, miscellaneous trinkets. When Jamie takes his seat, Voyeur crawls off his shoulder and down his chest to settle on a small throw pillow on the centre of the table. Both of them take long sips of their chamomile and lavender tea in silence, and Jamie allows himself to relax under the effects of the warm, calming fluid.

“Alright,” Amélie says. “Are you ready?”

Jamie takes in a deep lungful of air to try to get another layer of calm through himself. With one hand still grasping his mug, he places his hand palm-up on the table in front of Amélie.

“Yeah.”

She reaches out and delicately touches his arm with her manicured nails, following the contour of it to find his hand and place hers in it.

Jamie doesn’t feel anything different, but he wasn’t expecting to, either. He watches as Amélie lowers her head in concentration and deep thought, only interrupting herself to take a sip of tea. He lets her focus without interruption, even though that means being quiet for the longest time in his life that wasn’t sleeping.

After half an hour, Amélie lets go of his hand and places her mug on the table, crossing her arms and leaning on them. Jamie pulls his arm back toward himself and returns to fidgeting.

“Where do I begin?” she says with a sigh. After some time to think, she finally says, “First of all, Mako is incredibly head over heels for you. I’ve never seen a man so unapologetically in love with another person.”

Jamie feels his stomach drop with guilt. Ever since he remembered the moment he fled, he only harboured fear and hatred for a man he thought had been running a long con. “What makes you say that?” he asks.

“He’s always known your secret. The day you first met, he was terrified of you. He didn’t have to follow you into the book vault, and he certainly didn’t have to stay, but he did because he could see what you were and couldn’t figure out why a demon was in a library. When he accepted your number and a date, he was still trying to see what you were up to.”

Jamie gives a self-conscious smile as he reflects on his own memories of running across each other, now from a different angle. “I was just trying to live my...normal human life.”

“That’s what he realised when you turned him down for sex. He didn’t think an incubus would do that. He appreciated what you saw out of him, that what drew you to him wasn’t just being an easy meal for you. He saw how difficult it was for you to deny him--to fight against your instincts. He fell in love with you in that moment.”

Before he realises they’re coming, fat tears well up in Jamie’s eyes and roll down his cheeks. His breathing becomes choppy with sobs and he puts down his mug so he can hold his hand against his mouth as if it would stem the tide of his crying. He’s not afraid to cry, but Amélie has always been rather distant when it came to outward displays of emotions from others, but no one evades changing forever. She gestures in _Voyeur_ ’s direction, and the spider demon gets up to nudge a box of tissues closer to Jamie. It’s even got its own fancy container, which is _so_ like her, but indicates that it’s become a permanent fixture in her home. It only makes sense, given her line of work.

Jamie picks up a tissue and blots his eyes as dry as they can be right now, then blows whatever’s collected in his sinuses so far. He dares attempt to speak, but it comes out as “then whyehhahd--?”

Amélie pauses for a minute to try to parse what he just said. “Then why did he break your glamour?”

Jamie nods through his sobbing.

“It was an accident,” she says. “Do you recall a witch by the name of Nikora Rutledge, Witch of the Oceans?”

Rutledge? Obviously related to Mako, then. Jamie’s crying comes to a lull as he wracks his admittedly feeble memory of a _Nikora_. It sounds familiar, and he traces along some trains of thought to dig up what he knows.

“I met her a few times,” he says, his voice burdened. “Maori lady. Friend of the Fallen and part of the coven. She...died, right? Fighting _Diligence_ in New Zealand. The tsunami that happened because of it killed thousands...in...Aka...roa…”

His words trail off as the pieces come together. He remembers that time in the library when Mako was giving him a little break from his anxiety. At the sound of his realisation, Amélie nods.

“I don’t understand,” he says, staring at his mug. “Why would a witch not take the steps to make sure her firstborn was a daughter?”

Amélie shrugs. “No one knows. No one may ever know.”

Jamie grabs a second tissue, but doesn’t do much with it other than hold it to his mouth. “This is even worse than what I thought it was…”

He dries his eyes once again, downtrodden with the circumstance but feeling an odd sense of relief that at least the man he fell in love with wasn’t seeking to hurt him or to use him to his advantage -- Mako was just the victim of an unfortunate circumstance that will make him unable to interact with cosmic creatures such as Jamie for the rest of his life, else he runs the risk of hurting him again.

Jamie finishes the last sip of his tea, then pushes himself to stand up.

“Thank you for spending your time with me, Amélie. I know what I need to do now.”

Amélie arches her brow, and Jamie’s just reached the door by the time she turns her chin over her shoulder to call out, “What are you going to do?”

Jamie stops at the door frame to look at her, putting on a sad smile.

“I have to break up with him.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel, Ren, Woden's Skadi, Zalanye, Muppet, Gigi, and OfficialMettaton for supporting me this month!
> 
> Find me on Tumblr [here](http://murasakidoku.tumblr.com/)!


	14. XIV

By the time Jamie reaches Melbourne airspace, it’s about two in the morning. He lands stealthily near his student housing, then uses a nearby glossy window as a mirror to put on his glamour before stepping into the street. He may be an odd sight with the monastery raiments he borrowed for the return trip, but it would be better to be caught in this than naked.

Thankfully, he doesn’t need a key to get into his room--just the code to punch into the access panel. It clicks open and he pushes his way inside.

He’d forgotten how cluttered he’d left it -- but then again, it always _was_ cluttered. Upkeep of his own place was unimportant, even when he had the utmost of respect for Mako’s place while he was there.

Jamie internally debates with himself and decides, yeah, he might as well tidy up since he will perceivably be spending more time here once he finishes up with Mako. It only takes about an hour, since his room is a glorified shoebox with only enough room for a twin bed, a desk, a television, and a closet. It takes two large garbage bags to take care of the mess, but he doesn’t take care of them just yet. He reaches for the place he usually keeps his phone, but it’s empty.

Right. All of his stuff is still at Mako’s place. He looks down at his stump arm and realises that this is only going to make things more awkward or painful, but he’s not the kind of person to avoid conflict enough to prefer making a new set of limbs instead.

He’d might as well sleep first. It was a long flight on his own two wings, and he’ll need to rest to be in the right headspace for tomorrow.

He sleeps until later in the evening, which is for the best -- he knows Mako’s work schedule well enough by now to know this isn't one of his days off. Before he goes there, though, he changes into some normal street clothes, then heads to the same neighbourhood as Pleiades to visit a familiar hotel. He goes up to the penthouse floor and knocks on the door, and is met with several seconds of silent waiting before Sombra opens the door with messy hair and a wrinkled pyjama top and bottoms, glaring the wrath of all of Inferno at him.

_“¿Quién coño ere_ \--oh!” Her anger vanishes in a split second. “Jamie! You're back.”

He gives her a sheepish grin. “Hi, Sombra. Did I wake you up?”

“Well, yeah. It's 3 pm. You know I'm not up until 7.”

Jamie snorts a laugh. “I'm sorry, I just -- I need a favour.”

“What's that?”

“I need to go back to Mako’s apartment and pick up my things.” His expression falls. “I...I'm ending it with him.”

There's a long, shocked silence from Sombra. “What? Why?”

“He's Touched, Sombra,” he says with a helpless shrug. “He's not safe for me to be around...all this power and no way to control it. I need the backup...just in case he doesn't take it well.”

Sombra stares at him longer, studying minute details in his face before sighing. “Come on in,” she says, stepping aside to let him in. “I need to get ready.”

Jamie steps in and takes a seat at the large computer chair in front of an impressive setup that the hotel most definitely did not provide for her. An array of six widescreen monitors sit before him, in two rows of three. Most of them are showing small windowed videos of news broadcasts around the world, all of them playing audio at a low volume. The only exception is the lower centre monitor, which is full of coding text that is indecipherable to Jamie, which is probably the only reason why she hazards leaving it up.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Sombra asks from the bathroom.

Jamie tucks his full leg underneath his stump, and the foot of his borrowed prosthetic thumps awkwardly against the underside of her desk. “Yeah.”

“But you’re both crazy about each other…” Sombra peeks out from the doorframe of the bathroom. “...last time I checked.”

“Oh, yeah, for sure. But it’s all the more reason to do it.” Jamie’s sight focuses on nothing in particular in the distance as his brows bow under his sadness. “...I can’t imagine how he’d be able to live with himself if he killed me by accident.” He turns to Sombra and tries to put on the best smile that he can. “We can still be friends though.”

He doesn’t like the pencil-thin line that Sombra’s mouth turns into when she stares at him for that comment, her eyes narrowed as if his answer wasn’t good enough. She bows back into the bathroom to resume her makeup.

“You were right, for the record,” he adds, feeling suddenly guilty.

“I usually am, but what about this time?”

“His story,” Jamie responds. “It _was_ one that I wanted to know.”

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

**Sombra**

_15:43_

Are you at your flat?

**Mako**

_15:44_

Yeah. Why?

**Sombra**

_15:44_

Stay put. You’re about to have guests.

Mako figures that she means that some of the witches are headed his way, so he doesn’t bother trying to make himself any more presentable than he already is in his lounge clothes. When a knock echoes off his door, he puts his book down and stands up to answer the door.

He’s not expecting to look down and see Jamie standing there, with Sombra a few feet off to the side. There’s a long silence between them all as Mako stares at Jamie, until Jamie raises up a hand and waves his fingers at Mako timidly.

“Hi,” he says.

Mako is too choked by emotion to say anything. After two weeks of instantly vanishing from his life, he’s just... _there_ again. In that beat-up hoodie from forever ago, with a knot tied halfway down his right sleeve, his leg replaced with a mass-produced prosthetic where his cargo shorts end at his knees.

It’s like time has gone in reverse.

Since he’s unable to muster words, he tries the next best thing: action. He reaches out with his arms to embrace Jamie in a hug, but Jamie is quick to bolt backwards out of Mako’s reach before he can even touch him, backing up against the wall on the opposite side of the hallway.

Sombra is quick to react, placing her hand on Mako’s outstretched arm as electrical sparks close the gap between them. She glares threateningly at him and he turns to look at her.

Even though she’s made a show of it, he still has complete control over his body. A second passes, and he understands what she’s doing.

“Sorry,” Jamie says, after a few moments of perceptible awkwardness. “I just wanted to...pick up my stuff.”

Mako turns his attention from Sombra to Jamie and lowers his arms. Sombra lets go of him. Just here to pick up his stuff? No _I missed you_ or _I’m back_ or--anything like that?

“Are you breaking up with me?” Mako asks slowly.

Jamie’s expression is lopsided as he shrugs his shoulders. “I’m sorry, mate. I still love you...but we can’t be together. It’s not your fault, it’s…” He tilts his head to the side. “It’s no one’s fault what their background is, but it’s dangerous for us to stay together.”

Mako feels a tight restriction in his chest. She’d warned him about this, with such an accuracy that he wonders if she can see into the future. He glances at Sombra and she gives him a wordless but intentional blink, then he turns back to Jamie. He takes in a deep breath to steel his emotions. _Don’t fuck this up._

“I’d like the chance to show you something...before you decide that this is what you want to do.”

Jamie’s expression turns anguished. He doesn’t want this to be any harder than it needs to be, and he’s about to say as such before Sombra gently places a hand on his shoulder, bringing his attention to her.

“Alright,” he says. “Just...be quick about it, okay? This whole thing kinda sucks.”

Mako gives him a short nod. And steps back into his flat, closing the door behind him but leaving it ajar. After a moment, Jamie looks again at Sombra, who--to his surprise--has a cocky smirk on her face. Jamie’s eyebrow quirks at her, instantly tipped off that she has something up her sleeve and he mouths _What?_ at her, but her smirk just grows. He eyes move over to the door as it opens, and by the time Jamie looks over as well, he’s met face-to-face with a potted _Demon’s Guilt_ , sporting one large, flawless pale purple pitcher flower and full, dark, thick foliage surrounding it. It’s grown to a size that is impressive, but not impossible, for having been (a) grown outside of Inferno, and (b) in a small pot.

The implications dawn on Jamie in slow procession as Mako silently holds it out to him.

“We knew how important your relationship was to you, Jamie,” Sombra speaks up, the only one to break the silence. “The coven has been working Mako to the bone to train him so that you would be able to stay together.”

“You…” Jamie looks up at Mako. “...Grew this? By yourself?”

Mako nods. “It flowered in two days. I’ve just been keeping it pruned ever since.”

Jamie brings his hand to his mouth, feeling tears well up in his eyes. His core freezes over as he immediately feels shame overcome the ability to speak. He could only assume that Mako wouldn’t have the tools or resources to hone his skills, but if Mako could make an infernal flower -- especially as one as delicate and sensitive as _Demon’s Guilt_ \-- produce flowers without burning it out, then handling a fully grown Greater Sin like him should be child’s play.

But how did he grow such control of himself so quickly? It was only two weeks ago! _Worked him to the bone, did they?_ It’s hard to believe they would have gone out of their way just to salvage a friend’s relationship, but he does suppose he’s been a reliable person to go to for resources for several decades…

Jamie can’t make out the words. He can’t even sort out the feelings inside of him right now. For the last few days, he’s been torn between the desire to stay with Mako and the greatest happiness he’s ever known, but ultimately overpowered by his sense of self-preservation. Presented with the evidence in front of him, one new emotion breaks through it all: guilt. Guilt for having made so many assumptions about Mako, not limited to but including having not considered that Mako had the willpower and the resources to make sure that they could stay together.

Humans are always so consistently surprising.

“Shot glasses,” he chokes out. “I can’t drink this alone.”

Sombra’s eyebrows raise and she makes a noise of pleased surprise. Mako arches his own and looks at her, hoping that she’ll translate what this means.

“He feels that what happened isn’t solely your fault,” she explains. “He takes responsibility too.”

Jamie nods in agreement.

“I’ll go get some,” Mako says, turning to enter his condo again. Sombra places a comforting hand on Jamie’s shoulder as they follow Mako inside.

Mako places the pot on the table in front of his couch, where its home has been since Sombra dropped it off. As he goes back to the kitchenette to pull two souvenir shot glasses out of the cabinet, Jamie sits square in the middle of the couch, and Sombra pulls tissues from the box on Mako’s desk to give Jamie in order to dry his tears.

As Jamie places glasses on the coffee table, Mako sits besides Jamie in his usual spot. With just his single hand, Jamie plucks the pitcher flower from its stem and tilts it to pour a syrup-like black liquid from it. It’s enough to fill both glasses to near-fullness.

Jamie hands one to Mako, then picks up the other for himself. He sits askew, holding his glass into the air as if waiting for a toast.

“No more secrets,” Jamie says, his voice shaky. “From now on, we share everything.”

_Everything_ is a loaded word. There’s a lot of implication behind it for Mako, but he’s alright with that. Neither of them have told each other about their pasts, and frankly, Mako is more than happy to share his with Jamie, even as painful as it is.

“Agreed,” Mako says. “Everything.”

The soft clink of glass fills the condo and the two of them knock their drinks back. Mako, who has a self-admitted sweet tooth, jolts at how sweet the fluid is; it’s halfway between chocolate and blueberry. He supposes he can see how it would be a delicacy, but the thing that honestly surprises him the most is that Jamie, who really doesn’t like super-sweet things, doesn’t so much as flinch.

They both place their glasses on the table and Mako can still see the residue of the black syrup on the glass.

“So,” Sombra says, breaking the silence. “Now that I’m done with this fool’s errand, I’m going to go home and get a few more hours of sleep while you two make up.”

Jamie laughs. “Yeah, alright. Thanks for your support, Sombra.”

She winks at them and heads off, closing the door behind her. Mako and Jamie look at each other with muted smiles, but neither of them are sure what they should do now. Eventually, Jamie is the first one to speak up.

“I suppose I don’t need this any longer.”

He lifts up his hand and positions his middle finger against his thumb and snaps. His human visage vanishes, leaving in its wake the red-skinned, ashy-haired demon Mako always knew he was.

“And I don’t need these anymore,” Mako adds, bowing down and plucking his glasses from his face. He looks back up, allowing Jamie the chance to see his mismatched eyes.

“Hooley dooley. I can’t believe you managed to keep that hidden from me for so long…”

Mako grins and shrugs. “I’ve had a bit of practice.”

Jamie laughs. “Yeah, s’pose that’s right.”

He braces his stump arm against the back of the couch and pushes himself up so that he can kneel instead of sit to give himself a little bit extra height to lean in and wrap an arm and a half around Mako’s thick neck. Mako is just as quick to wrap his arms around Jamie, nuzzling against the closest he can get to Jamie’s temple now that there are horns in the way.

“I missed you, Mako.”

“I missed you too, Jamie.”

Jamie sits back and the two of them share a smile before going back in for a kiss. Jamie’s mind is already at peace again, and he almost can’t believe that, a few minutes ago, he was entertaining the idea of leaving Mako forever.

“I think we should spend some time catching up,” Mako suggests when they separate again. “And talking about the things we were trying to keep secret.”

“Fine with me,” Jamie says. “Wouldn’t mind spending the next few days tied to you like this anyway. For now, though...I could use somethin’ ta eat.”

Considering that it’s the first food that Jamie will have since leaving Nepal, he ends up reclining on the bed, smoking a bowl and going through two hundred and sixty two notifications on his phone while Mako fixes something for the both of them to eat.

When a dejected ‘oh’ echoes past the corner, Mako leans past the corner to look at him. “What’s wrong?”

“Hm?” Jamie looks up from his phone. “Oh, nothin’. Just readin’ up on the story Sombra set up so that people weren’t worryin’ about me. She just sent it to the both of us.”

“Ah. I’ll take a look at it later.” A pause as he returns to the food. “Where _did_ you go, anyway?”

Jamie lets out a thoughtful hum. “You know that necklace I have?”

“That chakra one?” Mako asks. “Yeah. Been a while since I’ve seen you wear it last.”

“Do you remember where I told you I got it?”

Mako thinks back on their conversation. It’s not _that_ hard, considering the geographical relevance of the object. “Tibet…?”

“Yeah. Went back to stay with those friends of mine. It’s a place called _Sanctuary_ , where exiles from both Inferno and Paradiso can live in peace and rehabilitate for permanent life on Earth.”

“You were in a safe place, then. I’m glad to hear that.”

“Yeah. It’s real pretty, too. Maybe we can go there together sometime.”

Mako smiles silently and taps the liquid off his cooking spoon on the edge of the pan. He sets it aside and turns the corner.

“Food done?” Jamie asks as he sees Mako moving away from it.

“Almost,” he responds, “just need to wait on the pasta to finish, then it’s ready.” Mako keeps coming closer, crawling up onto the bed on all fours. Even as it sinks under his weight, Jamie doesn’t budge -- he just gives the other a relaxed grin.

“How much longer?” he asks, as Mako hovers above him. Even though he’s supporting his weight on both his arms and legs, his bulky belly partially rests upon Jamie, almost pinning him to the spot.

“Three minutes.”

“Not enough for a quickie…”

Mako snorts in amusement as he leans in and nuzzles Jamie. “On an empty stomach to boot?”

“I would’ve been content with just a snack, but _nooo,_ ” Jamie teases as he nuzzles back. “ _Someone_ had to make a full meal for me.”

“I’m hungry too,” he sasses.

Jamie laughs as he leans up to capture Mako’s lips with his own.

“Then we’ll just have to make it dessert.”

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

A large, imposing portal opens up in the sky, just south of the mouth of the Yarra. It’s a full moon, and even in the light cast by it, the searing red edges of the portal turns everything the colour of blood. From the void-like centre of the portal, a body is spit out into the pull of gravity to plummet into the ocean below.

It’s cold, it’s wet, he can’t breathe. The saltwater stings his gaping wounds and he sucks in a mixture of water and air, flailing uselessly. He used to be such a great swimmer, sometimes even taking on the form of the human’s fabled mermaid to lure hapless and horny fools into his trap. He’d always been fond of the water on Earth, but now that he’s missing two limbs, he finds it overwhelming and suffocating.

_It is ironic that I would survive the trial far only to drown…_

He doesn’t know how long he’s been at it, he doesn’t know where he is -- all he’s trying to do is keep his head above the water, and he’s not even succeeding at that. He feels his energy being sapped from him by the second, and by the time he feels something grasping and pulling at him, he figures that some Earth creature has captured and intends to consume him.

_Why should I keep fighting?_ He asks himself, and he falls into the darkness.

He’s surprised when he comes back to consciousness. It’s a human-made dwelling, and it’s about as hot as it gets on Earth. There’s a woman sitting by a table; her face is square-shaped with a broad nose and dark olive skin with short, black hair, and she’s playing with a toddler child. He turns his head to get a better look at her, and the movement catches her attention. A bright smile creeps onto her face and she picks up her child to come sit on the bed beside the demon.

_“How are you feeling?”_  She asks, in her native tongue, slowly -- as if it would help him understand it better.

_“I throb with pain,”_ he answers in the same language. She’s instantly relieved that he knows her language. He tries to lift his arm but her hand immediately presses it down. “ _Rest,”_  she assures, _we’re trying to make sure you don’t get an infection. Do you think you could eat?”_

Eat? Of course he could eat; he hasn’t eaten anything in days. _“Yes. I’m very hungry.”_

She lets down the child to stand next to the bed, tasking the young one to “guard” him. The two of them exchange curious stares, and the demon--with his remaining hand--reaches out to touch the child. He’d only ever seen children from a distance before; only when puberty sets in do they generate the desires that he feeds on. Now, he exists in _their_ world.

The child reaches out as well, and their palms press against each other. The demon lets out a weak chuckle, and the child giggles in return.

_“What are you?”_ the mother asks as she cuts up vegetables. “ _There’s nothing like you in the Dreaming.”_

The Dreaming…? With that, he immediately knows where he is. Well, for the most part. 

_“I am from a place called Inferno, a supernatural dimension not unlike the Dreaming,”_  he explains. “ _I am a demon.”_

_“What happened to you?”_ She asks, unfazed at the information he’s given her.

He falls silent. He’s lived an unmeasurable time as a demon, loyal to the natural law of Inferno, but his memories of that time slip away like an easily forgotten dream.

_“I don’t know,”_ he admits.

She takes up the bowl of food, now that its contents have been cut into bite-size pieces, and she sits beside him on the bed again. She hand-feeds him textures and flavours that are alien to him, but he finds them quite pleasant.

_“Either way, you’re welcome to stay here,”_  she says. “ _You may not survive these wounds, but we’ll try to make the rest of your time as comfortable as possible.”_

But he does survive.

It takes a few fevers -- some of them hot enough to burn his human caretakers by touch alone -- that kill any and all infections caused by Earth-native bacteria. He becomes a fixture in the family, even in the community itself, and despite being so unearthly and struggling to unlearn his ingrained demon culture in exchange for human culture. He’s honest about his needs with his adoptive community and, to his surprise, finds it a lot easier to simply ask rather than trick them into it. Besides -- with a community where everyone knows everyone else, it’d be hard to get off scot-free otherwise...and he admits that he’s become protective of them, too.

Three generations pass before the current elder takes him aside to talk.

_“It’s time for you to go,”_ he says.

_“Why?”_ He asks, genuinely panicked. “ _Have I done something wrong?”_

_“No,”_  he answers. “ _I’ve discovered a place that you are meant to be right now. They call it Sanctuary. You have grown a lot under our care, but your journey is far from over.”_

The elder holds out his hand, and the demon does the same. A palm-sized, glowing, weighty blue marble is deposited in his hand, and after a moment of gentle swirling, a small purple glob of goop gathers at the centre, then presses itself against the northwest edge of the marble. It’s a magical heirloom that goes by many names, but the demon knows it by the name of _The Peripatric Compass._

_“Although you were not born from us, we still consider you part of our community. It’s only appropriate for you to take on your own rites, and come back to us even stronger than before.”_

The demon feels bittersweet about it. They have made him feel so welcome here; the sense of togetherness is something that he thought he’d lose when he was exiled, yet he knows that it would only make him be more ‘other’ if he refused to do his own rite of passage. The demon nods with tears in his eyes and, after saying his good-byes, takes off on his long flight to an unknown place.

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

“I guess you could say I’m a creature of habit,” Jamie admits, as he wipes his face with a napkin and sitting back in his chair. “This is my home, and it always will be.”

Mako is reminded of a conversation they’d had before: “Melbourne chose you.”

Jamie smiles at him. “Not that this place looks anything like it did when I first came here. I was away when the colonies came by and fucked everything up. News didn’t move as quickly back then as it does now. I have to live with that regret -- having not been here to defend my family.”

“Do you think you really would have been able to make a difference?” Mako asks bluntly. Jamie stares at him, and when he doesn’t answer, Mako shrugs. “It’s not like it was just a war that was lost. It was systematic. The government, the culture, it was all part of it. How would you be able to combat that?”

Jamie looks away and sighs. “I like to think that I would have rather died trying than to not have been there when they needed me.”

Mako lets out a thoughtful hum. “That compass that they gave you -- it never told you to return home, did it?”

Jamie shakes his head. “Even after I left Sanctuary, it guided me to travel the world. That’s how I met the members of the Coven. I didn’t come back until the compass told me to.”

“Then you were exactly where you needed to be.” Mako stands up and collects their dirty dishes, then heads back inside to wash them. Jamie stares incredulously the whole time.

“How could you say something so heartless?” Jamie spits. “The former identity of this country is fractured. I could have been here! I could have done something about it!”

“Jamie,” Mako says with a sigh. “You’re one demon and Australia is a big country. Best case scenario, even if you could have protected the Kulin alliance, the rest would still have suffered the same fate.”

Jamie comes back inside and closes the balcony door behind him. He takes a seat on the couch, crossing his arms and pouting.

“You’re not doing anyone any favours thinking that you’re some kind of saviour that missed your calling. Not them, and certainly not yourself.”

Jamie’s pout just grows exponentially and he hunches back into the cushion of the couch. There’s a long moment of begrudging silence before an epiphany suddenly hits Jamie, and he looks over to Mako with curiosity in his face.

“...Why do you talk about this like you’ve got experience?”

Mako’s motions slow as he finishes loading up the dishwasher and closes it. He stands upright, locks the machine, and gives Jamie a long, cautious -- yet unreadable expression. Jamie watches as he leaves the kitchenette area to go to his closet, sliding the mirrored doors to the right instead of the left, to do an awkward reach-around to get to the part of the closet clearly dedicated more to storage than actual daily use. If the flat was arranged differently, his desk wouldn’t be in the way of...whatever he’s trying to get to.

When he finds what he’s looking for, he returns to the couch. In his hands is a sturdy aluminium storage box, and when he sits down beside Jamie on the couch, he places it on his lap and opens it with a small key. He pulls the lid open and reaches into it to bring out a leather mask that is half pig-face, half legitimate gas mask, filters and eye lenses and all. It’s obviously been well-used, as the leather has been bleached by the sun, and it’s riddled with miscellaneous scrapes and scratches. It’s immaculately clean, despite its wear, and certainly not falling apart in the slightest; the straps have been carefully bound together for long term storage.

Mako hands it to Jamie.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel, Ren, Woden's Skadi, Zalanye, Muppet, Gigi, OfficialMettaton, and Lijan, for supporting me this month!
> 
> Find me on Tumblr [here!](http://murasakidoku.tumblr.com)


	15. XV

It’s another gorgeous day in southern California. It’s a shame that he spends most of it indoors in court.

He doesn’t really hate it. He doesn’t have to do much, really, besides be the moral support for the victim on the stand. He gives them nods when words get caught in their throat, when the fear steals their logic in the moment.

Mako Rutledge has always been a soft soul. He cares for animals, he cares for the weak, just like Mama taught him to, but that’s only the person he is on the inside. His external presence betrays everything else: coming in at a height most people would go their whole lives without seeing, five times the weight of the average person, a man of few words, rare to smile and even rarer to laugh. He’s not what most people consider _approachable_ , even though he’s the gentlest, sweetest person that one could have the luck to meet.

“Hey, Hog!”

Mako turns his head to look behind him, stopping in his tracks down the courthouse steps. A man wearing his colours and a proper blonde Fu Manchu comes up and gives a light punch to Mako’s arm.

“I heard that you guys got the conviction,” he says. “Congratulations!”

“Another asshole behind bars,” Mako agrees.

“Sweet Tooth’s case went over too,” his friend says. “We were thinkin’ about getting together and celebrating with a few drinks.”

Mako holds up a hand, and the other backs up a half-step. “I appreciate the invitation, but I’m already late to meet up with Sam for tea,” he explains. Despite being declined, the other man grins brightly. “Oh, of course! We’ll keep one cold for ya when you two finish up.”

“‘Ppreciate it, Sandy. I’ll see you later.”

They exchange a curt wave before moving on. Mako first returns home to change out of his stuffy suit and into his own colours, since Sam always loves a ride pillion around town. She was what The B.B.F. ( _Bulwark of Battered Families_ ) colloquially named “a coal-burn case”, someone who had been so affected by their case that even when the fire died, the psychological recovery was still a long ways away.

Mako didn’t mind being her friend on emergency dial. They bonded over cute animals, especially her big, fluffy Tibetan Mastiff, too-sweet tea, pastries, movies, and most importantly, the feel of wind against exposed skin when riding the streets of Los Angeles.

On the ride there, he thinks of how their favorite diner, Angel Sunbeams and Cake, added a new key-lime pastry to their menu, and how he plans on ordering one (or two, if it’s good) when they get there.

Nothing seems off until he parks on her driveway and cuts off the engine. As soon as he hears Siobhan barking, something already seems _off._ He doesn’t know what it is, but he knows the way that Siobhan always greets him from inside even before he gets off his bike, and these barks aren’t the usual short, happy ones he hears from her. These carry a whine at the beginning, which is a noise he doesn’t think he’s ever heard from her.

Mako gets off of his bike and walks up to the front door. He taps the knocker a few times, and Siobhan’s barks become more intense. As he stands and waits for a response, he pulls out his phone to see if she had sent him a message either rescheduling or cancelling, but he has nothing of the sort.

Siobhan continues to bark, with increasing distress. Sam does not answer her door. He tries the handle of it, but it’s locked tight.

Mako walks towards the garage and reaches down to lift up the door. It rattles on its hinges with the force behind his push. Sam’s dark blue Kia is parked inside, so she must be home. Maybe napping, or…

Regardless of what the options are, he finds himself walking into the garage, reaching for the knob of the door that allows for access to the kitchen from the garage, and he steps inside.

Siobhan is already there, with her tail tucked under her, trading in the barks for a persistent whine and anxiously dancing front paws. 

“What’s wrong, Sibby?” he asks quietly, as he lifts the pig-faced gas mask over his head and replacing it with his glasses. Siobhan turns in a circle and heads deeper into the house. They leave the kitchen and pass the stairwell to the second floor.

At the end of a linen tied to the bannister hangs Samantha.

Mako feels his blood turn to concrete.

He falls to his knees. This can’t be real - this has to be - a dream or something. Sam couldn’t possibly have done this, she was...on the road to recovery, she was…

Siobhan’s cold nose pressing against his fingers brings his attention from the horror in front of him. He forces himself to take a laboured breath and reaches into his back pocket to pull out his phone.

“911, what’s your emergency?”

“My friend. She…”

He stares up at her and finds it impossible to say the words, as if admitting it out loud would finalize the reality of it all.

“...Sir?”

“She’s dead,” he sobs out. Tears streak their way out from under his glasses. “She committed suicide.”

“Where are you located?”

He answers the operator’s questions as they’re asked. He doesn’t remember them all, feeling a protective numbness overcome him. When he comes back to reality with the sound of a knock on the door, triggering Siobhan’s fretful barking, he finds himself sitting on the floor of the living room, back up against the couch with Siobhan pressed up against him. 

He gets up off the floor and takes Siobhan by the collar and guides her to the front door. He tells her to “sit, stay” assertively enough for her to comply. Though it does little to lessen her unease, it keeps her in place while he opens the door for the police. There is no preamble, as the staircase is right in front of the door; Mako steps aside to let them in wordlessly.

“Roadhog,” a German-accented voice calls out in mild surprise. Probably the only man to come close to Mako’s height, Wilhelm Reinhardt was one of the police that were the first responders when Orlando first beat Samantha within an inch of her life. Since then, Wilhelm has been one of Mako’s closest police contacts. He gives a nod to his partner, and Wilhelm and Mako go to the kitchen so that he can ask further questions.

Wilhelm closes his notebook when they finish up. “I hope this will not make you stop what you are doing, my friend,” he says.

Mako doesn’t respond. He just tightens his grip on his phone.

“You can go far beyond what we can do as the police,” he continues. “You are one of the good guys. Don’t forget that.”

Mako silently looks up at him, and he stands up and puts a hand on Mako’s shoulder.

“Go home and rest,” he says. “We’ll take care of it from here.”

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

“But I ended up stopping it after all,” Mako says. “When my visa expired three months later, I didn’t have the heart to renew it. I took my savings and moved down here for a quieter life.”

Jamie has spent the entirety of Mako’s recollection with his knees pulled up to his chest, tracing his fingers against the weathered edges of the old mask. He looks up at Mako when he finally comes to a stop, and quietly asks:

“Do ya regret it?”

“Yeah,” he says with a sigh. “I shouldn’t have viewed it as a failure. I shouldn’t have let it tarnish the drive to help as many people as I could.” He turns to Jamie. “Because I thought of myself as someone who could have saved someone else’s life if I had just been at the right place at the right moment, I hurt myself and countless others that could’ve used my help.”

Jamie lets out a breath and places the mask on the coffee table, then stands up on his knees to wrap his arms around Mako’s head.

“Thank you,” he says. “For telling me that.”

“There’s more stories where that came from, but...we really ought to get some sleep first.”

Jamie laughs and reaches out for his discarded phone to check at the time -- and it immediately ceases his laughing. “Crikey, you’re right. Dibs on the bathroom!”

Mako opens his mouth to protest, on the grounds that his own nighttime routine is significantly longer than Jamie’s, but he closes his mouth and chuckles to himself.

All is right with the world tonight.

Mako gets the best sleep he’s had in days.

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

Jamie, however, wakes up completely spent.

He gently nudges himself out of Mako’s loose, sleep-ridden hold, and sits up to groggily rub at his eyes. Mako was a basketcase of lingering intrusive dreams and Jamie had to work overtime to fend off the anxiety dreams with crafted wet dreams that Mako wouldn’t remember in the morning -- because the trick to making people forget their dreams is to prevent them from waking up in the middle of them.

He may have overdone it last night, though. Jamie looks over his shoulder and spots the rigidly tented leg of Mako’s shorts. There’s no saying how long it’s been like that, and the fact that it’s not accompanied by any wet spots isn’t a terribly good sign.

It’s the first thing that Mako becomes painfully aware of when he wakes up. Jamie turns his head around to look at Mako’s face as he lifts his eye mask up and gets a good look at Jamie’s red skin glowing with the light from the morning sun, like rubies in the rough.

Languidly, Mako pulls himself free of his CPAP mask, strap by strap, then reaches over to deposit it on the bedside table.

“What did you do to me?” is the first words out of his mouth. Jamie’s expression turns into a sheepish grin, slightly panicked.

“W-what do you mean, what did I do to you?! Just because I’m out as an incubus it’s not like we can just blame me for things--”

Mako’s hand comes around and claps over Jamie’s mouth. “You’re a horrible liar,” he says, with no humor in his tone.

After a moment, Mako drops his hand. Jamie’s long ears droop and his tail curls in on itself. “I...I was just trying to help you sleep better. Your dreams were racing…”

Mako feels a tightness in his gut. Shit, he just made Jamie feel horrible just for doing what he thought was for the best. He sighs and puts a hand over his thigh. “Relax, Jamie. You did the right thing. It just hurts.”

Jamie’s ears immediately perk back up, a genuine smile appearing.

“I’m gonna need a real cold shower for this one…”

“Oh--uh, actually...I was hoping that I could take care of it for you.”

Mako takes pause. He considers the proposition in silence. With no input, Jamie shrugs innocently.

“I haven’t topped off since I left Tibet,” he explains. “Flew all the way back on my own itty-bitty wings. Trip like that tends ta make a bloke hungry! Besides…”

Jamie jabs a thumb over in the direction of the couch. The Demon’s Guilt flower, having served its use, is wilting, while the main, dark bluish grey plant itself is still thriving.

“I wanna see it for myself...your ability to control your power.”

It’s difficult to argue with that point--with _any_ point--when he can feel the stitches of his pyjamas straining against him and his dick feels like a finger that’s been zip-tied for an hour, but he still manages to find the self-control to give this some critical thought.

“I just woke up, Jamie,” he says. “What if I fuck up?”

Jamie shrugs. “I don’t have my glamour up right now, so ya really can’t fuck up hard enough ta hurt me. Not when ya made a Guilt bloom. Even if ya don’t get it perfect, I can give ya feedback.”

Mako has no choice but to trust that Jamie knows what he’s talking about -- to trust that he knows Mako better than Mako knows himself at this point. He turns over to lay on his back and Jamie immediately springs into action, settling between his legs.

“Oh, and don’t worry if I go real quiet on ya for a long time after. It’s normal. Just gimmie lots of cuddles and stay calm.”

Mako is sorely tempted to ask for an explanation, but when he feels Jamie’s fingers curl around his waistband and pull down, he settles for quietly filing that information away and relaxing into the bed.

Instead of pulling his shorts down, Jamie reaches in to wrap his single hand around Mako’s dick and sack, pushing the fabric down and behind the package with a smooth maneuver of his wrist and pinky finger. It gives Jamie the first chance to truly appreciate what Mako’s packing: a fatter but shorter cock than the one Jamie tailored for himself by Mako’s preferences, sprouting from a considerable, hairless fat pad that makes his balls look absolutely juicy. The head is an angry red from having to wait so long for attention, and a basic continuous ring protrudes out of his foreskin, nestled slightly under and to the side of the frenulum.

“Such a handsome boy,” Jamie comments with a titter. “Didn’t get to see much of ya last time…”

“Girl,” Mako grunts.

“Oh!” Jamie beams. “Of course. And she deserves ta be treated like a lady.” 

Mako lets out a sigh, content that Jamie immediately _gets_ it, exemplified by the gesture Jamie makes by gently massaging the head between his thumb and forefinger. 

“Would you be okay with me doing this raw?” he asks, continuing to rub.

“Are you sure you want to?”

Jamie shrugs. “Well, my secret’s out now, and I know we’re both clean.”

“How can you be sure of that?” Mako asks. He’s figured out by now that Jamie’s immune system can kill off any kind of infection, but Mako…

...well, he’s never been _tested,_ so he can’t say _positively_ that he doesn’t have something. Jamie simply rolls his eyes. “I’d be able to smell it on you if that were the case, mate. Serious--if yer not into it, just grab me a franger from the nightstand and we’ll get on with it.”

Mako looks over to said nightstand and considers it carefully, then pointedly looks back over at Jamie without moving his arm to bother with it. As the realization dawns on Jamie, a wide grin splits his face.

“I’m unnerved by how gleeful this makes you,” Mako comments as he watches Jamie disappear below the swell of his gut.

“I just prefer the taste of dick over the taste of rubber,” he explains, and it makes Mako bark out a laugh. He really can’t argue with that.

Jamie is considerate enough to do away with the easing in on account of Mako already reaching critical, and with bracing himself with his stump arm against Mako’s thigh, he sinks down to wrap his mouth around that red tip, his hand gripping and giving pulsing squeezes to the length that he can’t quite get at (yet). Jamie’s swirling tongue gets the first three inches appropriately wet, then he backs up to give a few apologetic kisses for making her wait so long.

Mako lets out a groan. When was the last time he got oral? Years. He doesn’t even remember who it was. As he sits there and gets treated, his mind goes through all of his exes to try to figure out which one it was, staring up at the ceiling since he wouldn’t get a decent view of the action even if he tried to sit up.  It only brings bitter memories to mind, enough to distract from the event at hand. He groans in irritation, but Jamie interprets it as a noise of pleasure. If only he could watch, he wouldn’t be so tempted to daydream…

A movement in the corner of his eye catches his attention. He turns his head and remembers that his entire closet’s doors are mirrors, and he’d have a perfect view if it weren’t for the pulled-out desk chair…

His arm span is a gift, it turns out, as he can reach over with little problem and push the chair in, giving himself a clear view of Jamie going to town under his gut. Now he’s able to watch Jamie’s pulled-taught lips and the way his head bobs up and down in time with the inadvertently lewd slurping noises he makes. Yeah, that’s a lot better…

Jamie opens his eyes just a little so that he can change things up, and immediately notices he’s being watched. He pulls back and smirks, giving a sultry look directly at the mirror to make it feel like he’s making eye contact with Mako. He sinks back down, allowing Mako’s cock to penetrate his mouth and press against the inside of his cheek, creating the visible profile of the rock hard erection. Jamie’s eyes roll back into his head as if it were ecstasy just to have the chance to suck on this thing and Mako mutters out an “oh, fuck.”

Jamie chuckles and sinks further, the lump in his cheek disappearing as it gets funneled into his throat, inch by slow inch, and the slick smoothness of his tongue and lips is replaced by the rigid tightness of his throat.

“Shit. Shit, Jamie--”

It takes too much time and yet not enough all at once to feel Jamie’s lips sinking into the fat pad at his base. He may not remember the last time he was given oral, but he knows for sure that he’s _never_ been granted deepthroat. He always told himself it’s because of his size. He’s aware that Jamie probably has the skills to do anything he wants to when it comes to sex, but the fact that he’s done it without any hesitation -- like this is something that he was in the habit of treating Mako to, makes him feel awfully sentimental. He reaches out with his hand so that he can just _touch_ Jamie, maybe just a shoulder or something, but he gets met with Jamie’s hand as he threads their fingers together.

Jamie’s head starts up a strong, consistent rhythm. It’s impressive that he can go so long without needing to back off for air, and a small voice far, far in the back of Mako’s mind tries to take note to ask how long he can really hold his breath. It’s the last coherent thought he has as he gets lost in the sensation of Jamie’s throat around his cock, their fingers wound together, the effortless look on his face as he chokes down dick--

Mako orgasms with a few quiet but low grunts, but remembers not to lose himself in it and tries to ground himself so that it doesn’t overpower Jamie, who faithfully has his mouth pressed against his base for the entire duration of Mako’s climax, swallowing the best he can around it, drinking and draining more than just his cum.

Jamie pulls himself off the slowly softening cock, leaving thick trails of saliva that keep them connected even when he’s cleared the whole thing, making a mess of his chin when they finally break. He starts crawling over the swell of Mako’s belly, not once letting go of his hand, which means that Mako only has one free hand to reach up to Jamie’s slobber-ridden chin and stroke his cheek.

“You gone quiet on me…?” Mako asks with curiosity.

“Mm...not really.” Jamie smiles. “You held back _too_ much.”

“Better than not enough,” he murmurs.

“Just proves you’ve got the right idea. Practice makes perfect.”

Mako chuckles and pushes himself up to give Jamie a kiss and lick his chin to clean it up, causing him to laugh.

“Alright, alright. You go clean up and I’ll make us a quick brekkie so you can get to work on time, okay?” Jamie asks.

“I could call out…”

“No you’re not. I know you want to spend the day with me but we don’t _have_ to do that here.”

Mako huffs out a laugh. “Point taken.”

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

The weather is rather comfortable and breezy for a summer Melbourne day. Jamie comments on it on the way to the library, but Mako just grins in response.

Jamie barely gets five steps into the library before he’s snatched up into the arms of Zarya, and because of being similar heights she practically hoists him into the ceiling as she hugs him tightly. In the quiet of the library, the sounds of his bones cracking echo through the stacks.

“Jamison! You are back!”

“Y-yeah,” he responds through a strained voice, “Missed ya Zar.”

“Zarya, you’re going to break him in half,” Mako jokingly warns.

Zarya laughs and gingerly places him back on the ground as if he were made of paper mache.

“What happened to you? I was worried sick.”

“Nervous breakdown,” he says dismissively. Mako cautiously watches him through the corner of his glasses as he explains it. “One semester left, ya know? Kinda went crazy trying to figure out what I was gonna do. Poor Mako had no idea what was going on with me.”

“Aw, Jamison. You do not need to worry about that. You are going to do great.” She pats the back of his shoulder.

Jamie gives her an off-kilter smile, then waves. “I’ll let you two get to work. I’ve got a whole backlog of messages to follow up on.”

Zarya chuckles, then musses up his hair. “I am not the only one who was worried.”

As Zarya and Mako get to their tasks, Jamie takes a seat at his usual studying spot within line of sight of Mako to work on exactly what he said he would. It’s a process that would go a lot faster if the people he was reaching back out to weren’t immediately responding, and he’s had to open up a note on his phone just so he can copy and paste individual explanations to his friends why he’s been gone and assuring them that he’s fine.

Mako doesn’t envy how much of a social butterfly Jamie is. It seems like an awful lot of work.

A few hours into shift, Mako’s so absorbed in his work that he doesn’t notice Jamie coming up from behind so that he could lean over Mako’s sitting form and wrap his arms around his neck, cuddling up against him. Mako looks up and tries to turn his head so that he can see Jamie.

“Something wrong?” he asks quietly.

“No,” Jamie answers. “I just read the text messages you sent me while I was gone.”

Text messages…? Oh. Mako completely forgot about them. Honestly, he’s even forgotten what he said.

“I missed you,” is the only thing he can think of.

“I appreciate it. That you cared enough to put this much work into it…nothing really says ‘I love you’ like an effort like that.”

Mako smirks. “Wouldn’t have been able to do it without the help of your friends.”

Jamie chuckles. “Swell group of sheilas, eh?”

“They sure are. Oh, Jamie--could you go through our mail and find the flyer for Coles? I noticed the fridge was looking pretty empty when packing our lunches.”

“Sure thing, mate.”

Tasked with coming up a grocery list, Jamie holds the responsibility of meal planning for the next week. When Mako gets off of work, they head to the closest store to the condo complex for the ever so dull task of shopping…

But for some reason, maybe it’s because it’s been so long since they last did it together, it’s a rather fond activity. Jamie is always surprisingly organized when it comes to this, knowing exactly where things are in the store and making his list appropriately. As he goes through the selection of cucumbers to find ones that he approves of, Mako finds himself distracted by something a few aisles over.

An octogenarian woman is hunched over her barely-filled cart, talking deliriously to herself-- something about Daisy and what she does and does not like. There’s a figure standing beside her, glowing with etherial light: she’s the height of a toddler, but her limbs are jointed like a ceramic doll -- likewise, her ivory skin is cracked with age, yet her shoulder-length golden blonde hair is in perfect shape. She clings to the hem of the woman’s dress as if she was the Daisy the woman keeps referring to.

The longer Mako stares, the faster his heart starts to beat. As soon as the angel starts to turn her head to look at Mako, he only gets a glimpse of her void-black eyes and doll-like profile, before he feels his head violently jerked to the side and lip-locked with an inappropriately passionate kiss with Jamie. The angel stares for a few seconds at the odd display with no hint of expression on her face--Mako doubts it can even emote--before turning away. Jamie breaks the kiss when she turns.

“ _What the fuck is wrong with you?_ ” Jamie hisses under his breath, his brows furrowed with anger. Mako is taken aback--Jamie’s never talked to him like that before. “ _Do you have a fucking deathwish?_ ”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Mako says, slightly panicked.

“You think I’d believe you’ve suddenly got a fetish for grandma ankles? You couldn’t possibly have made your staring more obvious, even with your sunglasses!”

Mako keeps his head pointed at Jamie as he looks over at the angel, following the old woman as she goes down another produce aisle. It disappears under the height of the columns of boxes.

“I don’t understand. You’ve done just fine ignoring them this whole time, why would you start--”

Jamie interrupts himself and glares in thought at Mako’s face.

“...What?” Mako eventually asks. Jamie is faster than Mako, though, and reaches up to hike Mako’s glasses up and study the deep blackness of his right eye.

“ _Jamie!_ ” Mako hisses, flinching and trying to pull his glasses back down. Jamie lets go of them when the realization dawns on him and they drop crookedly on the bridge of his nose, and Mako pushes it back up into place.

“Oh my God,” Jamie whispers in awe. “Oh my God,” he says again, covering his face with his hands.

“What’s wrong?” Mako asks, finding Jamie’s choice of oath a strange one considering the context.

“The coven released the lock on your vision,” he says through his hands. “I can’t believe-- _why would they do that?_ Are they trying to kill you? I don’t…”

Jamie takes in a deep breath and holds out his hands to calm himself down.

“We can talk about this later. Let’s just--finish up this errand and...just...don’t stare at things that glow, okay?” Jamie says, showing a surprising amount of self-control considering how animated he’s being.

Mako stares in confusion and blinks when Jamie collects his cucumbers. He takes in a deep breath and slowly lets it out.

Boy.

He probably should have mentioned that earlier, huh?

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel, Ren, Woden's Skadi, Zalanye, Muppet, Gigi, OfficialMettaton, and Lijan, for supporting me this month!
> 
> Find me on Tumblr [here](http://murasakidoku.tumblr.com)!


	16. XVI

“No, it’s _my_ turn to make dinner! You made lunch!” Jamie yells as the two of them haul grocery bags to Mako’s condo.

“It was a packed lunch, Jamie. That doesn’t count.”

“You still made it!”

“Sure, but I didn’t _cook_ anything. And since you were the last one to _cook_ something, it’s my turn.”

“Ugh! Look, let’s leave it up for dibs. Whoever can remember to call it once we finish the groceries gets to cook.”

He shrugs. “Fine with me.”

Mako isn’t sure if Jamie is exceptionally good at compartmentalising or if he’s just completely forgotten about what happened an hour ago. Just as soon as he’d gotten over his initial surprise, he seemed content to just go about life as normal...though obviously keeping an eye on Mako to make sure that he wasn’t staring every time the grandmother and her angel were sharing the same aisle as them.

When Mako finishes stocking the freezer, he glances over at Jamie, who stands in front of the kitchen sink, washing and peeling stickers off of fruit. He was expecting to immediately dive into the conversation as soon as they closed their door, which makes Mako start to seriously consider that maybe Jamie _did_ forget about it on the way back home...and makes it all the more awkward to bring it up on his own, since he doesn’t know how to approach the subject.

He may as well start with what worries him the most.

“Jamie. Are you mad at me?”

Jamie stops what he’s doing to turn his head toward Mako. For a split second, he’s confused -- “What?” -- before he recalls what Mako is talking about. “Oh.”

He puts down the fruit so he can properly turn around and wrap his arms up around Mako’s neck. Mako, in return, places his hands on Jamie’s hips.

“No, Mako, I’m not mad at you. I’m _scared_ for you. I’m mad at the coven for forcing this on you.”

“They didn’t force me, Jamie. They gave me a choice.”

Jamie blinks in confusion, then furrows his brows. “Did they explain what kind of responsibility it would mean?”

Mako nods. “Once they told me that it was my mother’s doing, I wanted it undone as soon as possible. I resented my mother’s efforts to keep me as far away from this part of her life as possible. This is what I want.”

Jamie breaks his hold from Mako and takes a step back, balling his hands up and pressing them into his face. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you ignorance is bliss? You’re going to have to pretend for the rest of your life you can’t see these things! Your mother was trying to protect you from that.”

“All the tools at her disposal, and she makes me half-blind? A cruel way to try to keep me safe,” Mako huffs. Jamie deflates and slouches, dropping his hands to his sides. He takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly, and returns to washing fruit, while Mako still stands there.

“Witches...as much as they perhaps try to convince themselves otherwise...are human just like any other. They make mistakes, and they forget things. When a witch intends to become pregnant with their firstborn, they create a potion from the petals of red azaleas and pink carnations and consume it the day of procreation to assure that only the x-gene sperm can impregnate her,” Jamie explains. “Meanwhile, the spell she had to do in order to blind you like that...would’ve required the natural moult of demon horns, an angel’s down, some kind of living sacrifice, and an average of 72 hours of being comatose. The only thing that makes sense to me, given the path of least resistance…” Jamie shrugs, “...is that she simply forgot to take her fertility potion and had to make up for her mistake.”

Mako considers this for a moment. “Alright. Assuming that’s the case, did she _really_ have to separate me from everything else? Being told ‘no’ just made me more curious. I read her tomes and notes when she was out of town -- that’s how I learned the names of demons and basic sigils and spells to help me with day-to-day stuff. Even if I couldn’t do what she did, I still wanted to learn.”

Jamie picks up his washed fruit and brings it to the fridge. Mako opens it for him, since his hands are full, and steps back to allow Jamie to put them away. “You would’ve hit a wall, eventually, without the aid of a Queen. Would you have been able to accept--”

An orange falls from the crook of Jamie’s elbow, headed toward the floor. Without thinking about it, the passage of time slows, and so does the orange’s descent, halting entirely as does Jamie’s talking. Casually, Mako leans down to pluck the orange out of the air and then stands back up, patiently holding it out so that Jamie can take it again at his leisure.

“--that? Oh, shit--”

Just as quickly as Jamie realises that the fruit slipped from his grip is it once again presented to him. Jamie stops to stare at Mako in awe, then chuckles awkwardly. Mako talked about meeting with the coven before for training, but this is the first time he’s really getting to see Mako _use_ his power.

“Been spending time with Tracer, I see.”

“Just a little. It came to me naturally.”

Jamie gets back to putting the fruit in storage, taking the orange that Mako has been holding out and putting it into place. “It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Nikora’s offspring would have such potential. She was powerful enough to defend the entire down under all by herself.”

Jamie stands up and Mako closes the refrigerator door. He sighs and rubs the back of his neck.

“It’s a shame that her firstborn ended up being male,” he says, looking down and unable to maintain eye contact. “You would’ve made an incredible protector of humanity.”

“The coven and I have been discussing that,” Mako says, and Jamie looks up at him with an arched brow. “We believe that there’s a demon out there that would be willing to make a pact with me.”

“What? Who’s that?”

Mako leans against the fridge, then pushes his glasses up to expose his eyes -- only to look down pointedly at Jamie. A couple moments pass while the gears in Jamie’s mind turn slowly and finally click into place.

He takes a step back.

“Oh no. No no no. No way. No! I can’t make a pact, Mako. I’m _Fallen!_ I’m an _exile!_ I can’t do that! _”_

“It has to be you,” Mako says, calmly. “You have the ability to make the decision _because_ you’re an exile.”

Jamie’s mouth opens to protest, then closes. That statement is correct, even though it comes with a plethora of assumptions. Most importantly…

“Wait.” Jamie holds up his hands. “Wait a minute. You’re telling me that you want to become a contracted witch? The guy that runs away from home every time someone close to him dies?”

Mako cringes. Did he really have to say it so scathingly? “We talked about that last night. The fear of failure shouldn’t make us falter from doing what matters to us.”

Jamie sighs and rubs at his forehead. “You’re really serious about this, aren’t you?”

“Of course. But…”

Mako takes a step forward to close the space between them. He places his hands on Jamie’s jaw, his thumbs across his cheeks. “I can’t emphasise how much that this is a decision for _you_ to make. Yes, you are an exile, but use that to your advantage. Tell me no, and we can live out the rest of my life pretending to be a normal, mortal couple, or you can tell me yes and we can elevate our relationship to a whole new level.”

Jamie stares into Mako’s eyes, silent and still. He reaches up and places his hands on the back of Mako’s, giving him a genuine smile.

“It means a lot to me,” he says, “that you offer me the freedom of choice. I’ll have to spend some time thinking about it, though...there’s a lot to this decision, and I want to make sure that it’s in both of our best interests.”

Mako smiles too. “Yeah, that’s fair. We don’t need to decide right now.” He leans forward and plants a kiss on Jamie’s forehead, making him giggle.

“Dibs on making dinner,” Jamie blurts out, causing Mako to curse. He’d used the distraction of the topic at hand to his advantage in order to rightfully claim his spot as tonight’s cook.

Outmanoeuvred once again!

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 

Jamie sighs out a groan as Mako settles on his dick.

“You know,” he starts as Mako starts rocking back and forth, “for a bloke that implied his age was slowing him down intimately, you haven't been struggling to keep up with me.”

“This is only all the times you teased me, come to bite you in the ass.”

“Funny, I don't see anything eating my ass right now.”

Jamie's smirk persists even as Mako mashes his hand into his face.

With Jamie spread-eagle on the bed, Mako has the opportunity to show Jamie his strength and stamina. Jamie presses his hands gently on Mako’s knees while he sits forward, shifting his weight so that he can shift forward and back, gliding up and down on Jamie's cock while the demon enjoys being sandwiched between Mako's weight and the bed, sinking far into the plush depths every time Mako bottoms out. It's his own little heaven on Earth.

It's not necessarily a rhythm that would bring Jamie to climax on his own, but he really doesn't need to be. Mako is treating himself to a thorough prostate massage on his own terms, and Jamie can feel the tingle every time his head brushes up against it. He's getting used like a toy and loving every second of it.

When Mako comes, he shudders out a breath and tries not to hold back this time. He focuses on the sensation as it radiates through his skin and gathers at his nethers, sending Jamie into a wriggling ecstasy, crying out as if Mako's orgasm was his own. 

As he bottoms out on Jamie's slowly laxing cock to rest (carefully, with most of his weight on his elbows and knees) above him, he leans in and gives a few kisses to him as both of them pant.

“Jamie?” Mako asks, curiously, and Jamie responds only by opening his eyes and making unfocused eye contact with Mako. This must have been that 'quiet’ thing that he was talking about, but he doesn't seem to be any pain or fretting -- so he must be okay. He leaves a few more kisses, noting a small, static-like sensation every time he does. He brings his hands up and pets his fingers through Jamie's hair behind his horns. After a few minutes of gentle cuddling, Jamie takes a deep breath and finally speaks:

“Mako.”

“Yeah?” he asks, suddenly at attention.

“You can lay on me,” Jamie says. “I don’t mind.”

“Are you...sure?”

“Please, Mako. I could nap under a boulder.”

He hesitates for a second, but ultimately follows through. He slowly drops from standing on his elbows and knees, practically subsuming all of Jamie except for his shoulders and up. Jamie pulls his arms up to release them out from Mako, then drapes them over Mako’s shoulders loosely while Mako tucks his head under Jamie’s chin.

“I’ve always wanted to cuddle with someone like this,” Mako admits hesitantly. He’s never asked for obvious reasons. Jamie doesn’t seem to be in pain or struggling to breathe, so he relaxes properly as Jamie only chuckles in response.

The truth is that he always knew. He still doesn’t feel like speaking right now, but he couldn’t stand the sensation that Mako was holding back on his intimacy. He doesn’t use his mind-reading abilities just to cater to dick preference, after all; this is an important part of intimacy too.

Mako dozes off, not quite to sleep, after a while. He gets gently jostled into wakefulness when Jamie turns his head to plant a kiss on Mako’s hair.

“Have we licked our wounds enough so I can start going back to classes?”

A guilty pit finds its way into Mako’s stomach. “I completely forgot that you even went to university…”

Jamie shrugs. “I’m not worried about it. I can catch up, and besides...if I finish it out, this will be my second to last term.”

“Far be it for me to keep you from it any longer…” Mako’s eyes close again. “Besides, we can spend time together while you study like you’ve done before.”

Jamie scoffs. “I may as well move in here at this point…”

“You can if you want.”

There’s a pause. He just so casually says it that Jamie has to give himself a reality check to make sure that he really heard him for real. “Ya mean it?”

“Of course,” Mako says as he nuzzles Jamie’s neck. “I mean, how many times have you been to your place in the last couple months?”

Jamie falls silent. He can only recall less than a handful of times he’s been to his apartment for more than just picking up clothes or other personal effects ever since he started staying over for the night at Mako’s. 

“Besides, if this is your last semester, they won’t let you stay in student living for much longer...right?”

“Alright, alright,” Jamie acquiesces. “If yer that insistent that I move in with ya, I have no objections. But yer gonna have to help me pack up. And I’m not gonna quit my job!”

Mako heaves his shoulders and it makes for an awkward conversational shrug given their current position. Silently, in the back of his mind, an idea starts to hatch.

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

“Hello, Jamie.”

He almost jolts a foot into the air when he’s suddenly addressed. He really should have expected it, given that he left his door wide open, but he wasn’t expecting _who_ it is.

From his spot on the floor of the middle of his dorm, he looks up at none other than Ana. His mouth draws into an unamused line as he stares up at her.

“Oh,” he says flatly, “it’s you.”

Ana takes a step inside and turns to delicately close the door behind her. She takes the few strides needed to get to his bed and takes a seat on the edge of it, crossing her legs. “You didn’t tell us you were back,” she says, sounding mock-hurt. 

“Yeah, well...”

Jamie stands up and turns around to face her, leaning his butt up against his desk.

“You sure took advantage of me being gone,” he spits.

“In our defence,” she says, rolling a shoulder in a shrug, “we hadn’t exactly expected things to unfold like they did.”

“But you still _planned_ it.”

“Of course.” Ana smirks, gesturing with a wave to her single exposed eye. “I have always kept my eye on Nikora’s son. It has been, perhaps, out of guilt…”

Jamie squints. “What are you talking about?”

“You haven’t figured it out yet? A blinding spell like that takes more than one witch to pull off, and a sacrifice…” She moves her hand over to the other side and lifts up her eyepatch, revealing a perfectly healthy but all-black eyeball, “...or, as they say: an eye for an eye.”

Jamie feels the air in his lungs become stale as he stares at her. There are so many implications with this. His head swims with so many questions that immediately answer themselves. He wonders how could she fight without seeing angels -- but remembers that her aptitude wouldn’t need her to. He remembers being wired thirty-thousand dollars almost fifty years ago for his freshly shed horns. _His own horns_ were used in a spell to blind the man he’d eventually fall in love with.

Jamie places his hands on his face and slides down to sit on the floor once again, curling his tail around his ankles as he sits in a foetal position.

“Nikora was a close friend of mine,” she says, lowering her eye patch. “We always had a friendly competition for the seat of Superior and regularly exchanged the title between each other, but that stopped when she became pregnant and forgot to assure it would be a girl. She came to me to ask for advice, and that’s when I recommended that she turn him blind from angels to protect him. If you must blame anyone for what happened to him...blame me.”

Jamie inhales sharply and lets his hands drop to the ground. “It _worked,_ ” he says. “Why would you reverse it?”

“ _You_ walked into his life.”

Jamie looks up at her with an arched brow. Ana leans to the side and pulls out a phone from her bag, taps and scrolls on it, then holds it out for Jamie to take. When he does, he sees pictures of the doorframe around the entrance to Mako’s library. What he had just written off as ornate details were actually sigils to ward off demons; generally successful even against the strongest demons...unless they’re Fallen.

“As the son of a witch strong enough to hold the title of Superior, he would always have a natural aptitude for magic. Nikora picked up on that early on, so she tried to keep him as far away from magic as possible...but he’s always pursued curiosities with reckless abandon.”

She gestures to Jamie to indicate that he, too, would have fallen into the category of _curiosities pursued with reckless abandon._

“And so, he spent months absorbing your demonic aura by proxy. We’ve ultimately come to this inevitable fate; we’ve only cured his blindness, the rest has been his natural-born skill and the gentle nudging from our coven. Now you’re in a privileged position: you could be the first demon to ever make a contracted male witch in human history.”

Jamie reaches out with her phone so that she can take it from him. When she does, he sits back against his desk in contemplative silence, staring at the floor.

“...but what is he _meant_ to be?” he finally asks.

Ana can’t help but chuckle. “All these years living amongst humans and you still fall back on a demon’s mentality.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Ana twists her braid between her fingers with amusement. “He wasn’t born into a permanent fate, despite our best efforts. He’s _only_ forty-eight years old,” she says with a smirk, “He can become whatever he wants to be, just like you did.”

“But it means that I’d have to put my life on the line... _multiple_ times,” he retorts.

“Well, yes…” Ana says slowly, as she stands up. “But something tells me you’re willing to do that for him.”

He watches her go to the door and let herself out. Before she closes the door, though, she peeks in one last time to say, “If you have any questions, you know how to get a hold of me.”

Jamie’s head is too busy swirling with realisations to protest. He sits, dumbfounded, on the floor; he has no idea how much time passes before there’s a knock on the door. He gets up and opens it to find Mako standing by with a stack of collapsed cardboard boxes.

“Hey. Sorry I’m late.”

“No worries, mate,” Jamie says as he steps aside to let Mako in. “Wasn’t waiting long. Uh--sorry about the mess.”

As Mako stands in the middle of the room, his right thigh touches the edge of Jamie’s bed, while the other touches the edge of Jamie’s desk. There’s an awkward moment after Jamie closes the door as they come to the same conclusion spontaneously:

“This dorm was not designed for someone my size,” Mako comments. Jamie chuckles.

“Feel free to take a seat on the bed. I’ll be your legs.”

As Mako does so, he sets the collapsed boxes up against the bed. He produces a bag with some vital implements: a packing tape on a roller, scissors, a box cutter, and a box of black and blue markers.

“I always wondered why you never invited me over,” Mako says. “But now I see -- there’s no room to actually...hang out.”

Jamie chuckles bashfully. “Yeah, I, uh...really wanted a space just to myself so I could break glamour in safety if I needed to. I’ve never invited someone over just in case there were...tells.” He shrugs, feeling like that’s the most adequate way to say _proof that I’m not actually human._

“We’ll get you out of this shoebox once and for all.” Mako grins. “Let’s start with the stuff on and in your desk.” 

Jamie tries to use the task at hand as a distraction from the matter at hand and the emotions swirling in his head. Keeping his hands busy was always the trick to keeping him calm, as he hands each item to Mako and he plays Tetris to get them into the box in the most space-efficient manner possible. His mistake was thinking he could get away with it.

“Hey, Jamie?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re being kinda quiet today,” Mako says. “You okay?”

Jamie slows to a stop and fiddles with a triangle highlighter. He sighs, softly and defeatedly, then turns around to take a seat beside Mako.

“I’ve been thinking about your…” Jamie shrugs a shoulder. “Proposal.”

“That tone doesn’t bode well,” Mako says, trying to alleviate the anxiety in his gut.

“No, no, it’s okay -- I haven’t made up my mind yet. Ana actually came by earlier to talk to me about it.”

“Oh?” Of all the coven, Mako has interacted with the Superior the least of all of them -- which, in a way, comes as a surprise to him, since she was introduced to him as the mentor. In fact, he wouldn’t have known if she was still in the county or not at this point. “What did she have to say?”

“I dunno if she told me in confidence…”

“Did she specify?”

Jamie pauses. “No...but it seems like it’s the kind of thing that only she can have the right to talk about.”

Mako arches a brow. Jamie turns to look at him, studies his expression in silence for a moment, then slumps forward with a sigh. “My theory about your mum not making sure you were born as a girl was right. Turns out she was the one to give your mum the idea to blind you. And...it turns out...the reason why she wears an eyepatch is because the sacrifice they made was her own vision. And the horn moult they used for the spell was...mine.”

There’s a moment’s pause before Mako tilts his head to the side in confusion. It’s an unexpected revelation, but not exactly startling. “None of this comes as a left-field surprise for me. Does it change how you feel?”

“It seems weird to me for all of this effort, all of this sacrifice, to be spent trying to steer your life in one, irrefutable direction, but we could change it all...practically overnight.”

“So?”

Jamie rubs the back of his neck. “The demons of Inferno are born into their roles. Never are they allowed to pursue something different in their lives...it’s even a habit that humans fall into. And, if this is what we want to do, we would never be able to make a choice like that again. I don’t want you to regret not choosing a peaceful life…”

“The alternative is the same thing, isn’t it?”

Jamie immediately looks up at Mako with an arched brow. “What?”

“You’ll probably get another fifty years out of me, and then I’m gonna be gone and become part of the giant death machine in the sky. There wouldn’t be any changing after that point, either.”

The demon is quiet as he contemplates that future. He thinks about Mako growing old, and how Jamie would probably emulate the same to keep up appearances. He thinks about watching Mako die, and...what would he do with his life after that point? He’d spent centuries trying to chase down this feeling, just to watch it expire with the relative blink of an eye that the human lifespan is to him. Could he go back to that hunt again without losing his mind (any more) in the process?

Jamie would rather die.

He would rather die _for_ him.

He places his hand on the back of Mako’s.

“You know it’s dangerous for me, right?” he asks. Mako shakes his head.

“No one’s told me what your part of it would be.”

“I would have to go back to Inferno, where I’m marked for death--” despite having his glamour up right now, he swings his notched tail into Mako’s vision “--and fight off the competition. Every demon wants to become a Queen, and they certainly wouldn’t have any qualms about _eliminating_ me from the competition. Assuming I’m successful, and we make the contract, I return to Inferno to forge your weapon from the essence of a Lesser Sin, and considering I would have _just_ developed a new set of powers, I’d either learn them or die trying.”

Mako’s mouth draws into a line and he bows his head down. He doesn’t really want Jamie putting himself in danger like that...even though this rite of passage is equally dangerous for both of them, only to lead them into lives of constant strife.

“I’d do it, though.”

Mako looks up at him again, finding Jamie smiling, even through palpable anxiety.

“I’d do it for you,” he repeats, “but only if you marry me.”

Mako’s eyes widen at the sudden ultimatum. On the surface, it seems like such a severe thing to agree to, but when compared to a contract, it’s practically a footnote. He grins with a soft chuckle.

“Of course.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel, Ren, Woden's Skadi, Zalanye, Muppet, Gigi, OfficialMettaton, and Lijan for supporting me this month!
> 
> Find me on Tumblr [here](http://murasakidoku.tumblr.com)!


	17. XVII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys!
> 
> You may have noticed that this chapter comes extremely late. I've actually started going back to school -- currently taking 16 credit hours -- and thus have very little to no time to write. The fic will be on hiatus for the rest of the semester but it'll get picked back up when school is out!
> 
> Thank you for your patience, everyone. I really appreciate it.

Mako’s life becomes incredibly busy practically overnight. He hires a handful of additional, experienced staff to work the library so that he can focus more on what matters to him the most right now: a personal project to come as a surprise for Jamie, practicing and refining his craft, and planning a wedding.

He pretty much sticks to practicing and planning when Jamie is around, to minimise the chance that his surprise will be ruined. As Jamie works on schoolwork while sitting beside Mako on the couch, Mako uses Jamie’s tablet to browse options and putting together collages of his different ideas to bounce them off of Jamie.

Every so often, as he should, Jamie takes a break. He leans against Mako’s arm to look at the tablet screen. “Whatcha workin’ on?”

“Picking out a ring,” he answers. “Trying to find something that I like that will stand out against all the other rings I have.”

“Hmm. It’s temptin’ ta suggest gettin’ something gold in that case, but I wouldn’t recommend it.”

“Why’s that?”

“Gold is a pretty common ingredient for potions,” Jamie explains. “Even if you try to avoid it, it may dissolve or alchemise to something else in the process of handling the solvents.”

“Alright, fair enough. What would you recommend instead?”

Jamie sits back and thinks, tapping a long, coffin-edged nail against his chin. Mako casts a look over to him; even though he’s always been able to see Jamie’s true form, it’s not at all like seeing it in person. Features that were slightly blurry, slightly obscured through the filter of his glamour, are now bared, every detail like his long nails and the studs in his long, emotive ears, and each ridge in his chitinous horns to drink in.

For some reason, Mako finds it appealing to see him there in his real form and wearing his casual clothes, but with his pants hiked dangerously low on his hips so that his tail can come out over the waistband. The end of his tail swishes as he thinks.

“Platinum,” he finally says. “Only ever used as a catalyst. Same with steel.”

“Most of my jewellery is already platinum or steel,” Mako returns, slightly disheartened.

Jamie shrugs. “You can still find something that stands out.” A beat, then he adds: “I want ours to match, too.”

“Do you mean go together as a set, or be the same thing?”

“The same thing, yeah.”

Mako hums thoughtfully and scrolls back to the top of the page, adjusts his search filter, and starts going through the list again while Jamie returns to his schoolwork. He picks out a few that he likes (and thinks that Jamie will like) to debate further at a later time, then moves on to check his bank account to see if some of the checks that he’s written this week have gone through yet. In the process, he finds a charge that he’s practically forgot about because of its years-old regularity. Funny that it should come up now…

He turns to Jamie. “Hey,” he says, to get Jamie’s attention away from his work. “Do you want to go to New Zealand?”

Jamie’s expression lights up with the idea of going on a vacation with Mako, but remembers that he has responsibilities. “When? And why?”

Mako shrugs. “Whenever you have some time off,” he says. “I just remembered that there’s a storage container back home full of my mother's witch stuff. I never got rid of it because I didn’t want strangers running across it, and I didn’t burn it for...obvious reasons.”

“Oh!” Jamie’s grin widens. “I’d love that. I bet we’ll find some good stuff there! But I won’t have any time off until summer term ends, which is…uh, sometime late February. But we’ll have a week or so between that and the next term.”

“Could you get those exact dates for me so I can get us some plane tickets?”

“Sure! It’ll be fun.”

Or so he says. The timing of Jamie getting time off from classes, combined with the relatively short notice and Mako’s refusal to let any time go to waste for what is effectively a vacation for both of them, lands them in a flight for Christchurch at 4:25 in the morning.

Mako never thought that Jamie would be cranky, but he’s so tired and out of it that he finds Jamie’s half-hearted whining and dragging his feet kind of endearing. He ushers his sleepy demon boyfriend and their luggage through the barely-crowded airport, gets him breakfast and tea, and tries to keep him awake long enough to get him on the plane and shuffled into their three-seat row.

He lasts long enough to ask for some lemon-lime soda from the stewardess, but is passed out and wrapped around Mako’s arm by the time the cart gets to them. Thankfully, Jamie has all the room in the world to spread out, since Mako had to buy two chairs to fit himself. It’s awkward and uncomfortable, considering that the chair is made for two butts and not one. He’s wide enough so that even using the armrest would have his elbow jammed into his side. Thankfully, the remaining seat is taken by Jamie, so he doesn’t feel as bad with his arm hanging into his space. He knew Jamie was tired, but he wasn’t expecting Jamie to lean into that arm and cling to it like a sleeping koala.

It means that he can only read his book with one hand, but it’s a small sacrifice in the name of simply turning his head and looking at the most adorable thing on this side of the Trinity of Realities. Even if it is drooling on him every so often.

He envies Jamie. He’s just as tired and sleep-deprived but he can’t get comfortable enough to even think of sleeping, much less attempt it. Even though he’s bought three seats (two for himself and one for Jamie) they should, in theory, have enough consolidated room for Mako to get comfortable.

But only in theory. Mako is fond of his height in a social sense, but not quite in the practical sense.

When they land, Mako waits for the rest of the people on the airplane to shuffle out, affording Jamie a couple more minutes of sleep. Once they and the staff are the only ones left, Mako turns his hand around and uses his fingertips to gently tickle Jamie’s stomach. He comes to slowly, then mildly startles when he realises he’s not waking up in bed. A few seconds later, he remembers where they are and why and relaxes, sighing out and leaning back into his chair.

He looks even worse than he did earlier.

“Jamie, are you okay?” Mako asks.

“Too many people sleeping,” he groggily croaks out. “Too many dreams.”

Mako doesn’t really understand what he means, but figures that this isn’t the time to ask. He stands up and scoots out into the aisle so he can fetch the overhead luggage, then steps back and watches Jamie peel each step off of the ground.

“You can spend the rest of the day resting,” Mako tells him, hoping it’ll bring some motivation to him. “Once we get to the hotel.”

Jamie mumbles something incoherent and keeps on trucking slowly, but surely. When they get off the plane, Mako has to walk a little slower than he usually does -- despite not being a fast walker to begin with -- to make sure that Jamie can keep up with him.

A dull moment at baggage claim and a taxi ride later, Mako and Jamie arrive at their hotel in Christchurch. Jamie doesn’t have enough awareness to realise it’s beach-side until they get into their room and pulls the curtains open, revealing their ocean view.

It brings a smile to his face, watching the early morning sun over the water, despite his fatigue. It lasts for a few seconds before vanishing, and he closes the curtains just as they were before turning and unceremoniously collapsing on the bed. Mako smirks to himself and unpacks both of their luggage, leaving Jamie to rest relatively undisturbed.

It doesn’t take him that long to get everything sorted away, but he finds himself too restless to join Jamie when he was finished, despite running on less than six hours of sleep. He goes over to the desk and its provided notepad, scribbling out the message:

I’ve gone to check out the amenities at the beach.

-Mak♡

He then approaches the bed and leans over Jamie, pushing up his sleeve so that he can gently pull off his prosthetic arm before following the same procedure with his leg. Jamie remains completely undisturbed by the process of taking them off, but Mako knows he already feels a little more comfortable. He places them on the edge of the bed so that Jamie has easy access to them when he wakes up, then tucks his hand-written note between the prosthesis’s thumb and palm. He changes into his swimwear and heads downstairs to enjoy the sunshine.

When Jamie wakes up, it’s about 2 in the afternoon. It’s cool and dark, and he feels pleasantly rested, but somewhat woozy. He gets up and notices that his prosthetics aren’t attached, despite not remembering the act of taking them off before he fell asleep, but the mystery doesn’t last long when he picks up the note held in his fingers.

The beach, huh…?

He gives it some thought and decides to equip himself with his water prosthetics -- after having to dig through the hotel to find where Mako stored them, of course. He puts on his tight jammers and throws a towel over his shoulders, then heads downstairs.

It’s rather busy when he gets down to the ground floor -- not surprising, given the time of year, and the fact that this place is downright idyllic. Alabaster concrete pathways cut through meticulously manicured foliage, all of them in different states of blooming, in every colour that the human eye can see. Tall trees provide shade across walkways, leaving only specks of light that manage to reach through their palm fronds to hit the ground below. Between the wings of the horseshoe-shaped building of the hotel, there is an open-air restaurant on the northern half, and a pool on the southern half. The pool is absolutely crawling with people, but the restaurant only has a smattering of people, probably because it’s too late for lunch and too early for dinner. 

The foliage, while pleasing to look at and be around, makes person-scouting a difficult task. Jamie closes his eyes and tunes out the world around him -- the heat from the sun, the cool ocean breeze, the sound of people chattering -- and seeks for a familiar aura: like a scent composed of a sweet wood, with an aged spice to it.

When he finds it, he finds himself pulled in the direction of the restaurant. As he nears it, he can see Mako’s frame sitting at the bar, farther in under the palm-thatched roof. He can see that he’s talking to the bartender, but he can’t actually see the bartender until he gets much, much closer.

When he does, he loudly gasps at the sight of them.

He stands tall, though not quite as tall as either Jamie or Mako, but he’s built far more than your average human...or demon. His skin is like black marble, with paint-like streaks of white throughout, most prominently on his face. On top of his bald head are two fuzzy, pointed caracal ears, which swivel with attention more like a bat’s than a cat’s. It’s only appropriate, after all, since the back of the demon’s head is the rest of the caracal’s face.

A Kishi.

His visage, however, is that of an Nigerian man, rocking that bald look without fear. He wears a tasteful tropical print shirt, presumably as part of the dress code for an employee.

Both demon and Mako turn to him when he gasps. The Kishi looks at him with a fraction of the surprise that Jamie put out, but Mako is delighted as he holds a hand out to present Jamie to this strange demon.

“Speak of the devil,” he says, without a hint of irony. “This is Jamie.”

Jamie isn’t sure what to make of this situation, so he simply remains on the spot, silent.

With an amused tone and a smirk, the Kishi says, “You did not tell me your fiancé was a…”

His sentence ends abruptly. All three people know exactly what he was going to say, but he switches it after a delay:

“...an amputee,” he finishes, holding out his hand over the counter as if to shake Jamie’s. Jamie looks down at the offered hand and observes that the middle and ring fingers are completely missing from his hand. A Fallen; an usurper.

“Slipped my mind,” Mako says, with only a drop of blasé cheek, as Jamie completes the handshake.

“Pleasure ta meet ya, uh…?”

“Akande.” His voice is, as expected of a Kishi, smooth as silk, his accent brings hard consonants and vowels and is as clear as the sky for it. “Please,” he says with disarming humility, “the pleasure is all mine.”

It makes sense for an exiled Kishi to take up bartending as a job here on the mortal realm. The smooth-talking demon would have an easy time talking up the egos of humans in an environment where defences are down and spirits are up. Many Lesser Indulgences of the Pride family nest near bars -- sometimes even more so than malls, salons, and fashion models.

But I wonder how his flair compares to Tracer’s, Jamie thinks to himself.

“So...you two were talkin’ about me? Good things, I hope.” Jamie laughs nervously, still trying to figure out how he feels about Mako hanging out with another exile.

“About your upcoming wedding,” Akande corrects. “I have been giving him a hard time about skipping the marriage and going straight to the honeymoon.”

Jamie pauses for a moment, then chuckles. “I hadn’t thought about it that way, but I guess yer right.” He turns to Mako. “Did ya want ta have our honeymoon in New Zealand?”

Mako shrugs. “I wasn’t going to make my decision without hearing what you wanted to do.”

So a yes then. Kind of. “Yeah. Just here for business for now,” Jamie agrees.

“You two pick awfully romantic places to do business.” His tone is teasing more than genuinely critical.

Jamie surprises himself when he bites back the words He’s a witch, what do you expect? And glances to Mako.

“Curiosity drives me,” Mako says. “I saw that this place had been built since I last lived here, so I wanted to check it out.”

At least he’s aware of his own quirk.

“Speaking of which,” Jamie says, finding opportunity for a segue -- “I figured you’d be out by the water. I wanted to go for a swim.”

“Oh!” Mako grins. “Yeah, we can do that.” He turns to Akande and gives him a brief nod in farewell. “I’ll drop by when I get thirsty again.”

He scoots off the barstool and leads the way to the beach. As the two of them leave the shade of the restaurant, Jamie looks behind him to catch sight of Akande one last time, who also has a watchful eye--but a smirk as well.

Jamie scowls.

After they’re out of earshot, Mako turns his head to speak over his shoulder at Jamie: “How funny. I never thought I’d see you like this.”

He really does not like the tone in Mako’s voice. “Like what?”

“Jealous.”

Jamie’s eyes widen and he immediately feels his temper flare up. His invisible tail swishes violently behind him and he comes to an immediate stop, clenching his fists. When Mako stops hearing his footfalls, he stops as well, turning to the side with a know-it-all smirk.

But he doesn’t know it all.

“I am not jealous,” Jamie hisses, barely avoiding a full-on shriek of anger. “Do ya have any idea how much danger you were in?! Not all fallen demons are as considerate and philanthropic as I am!”

Mako huffs out a laugh. “You sound jealous, Jamie.”

Jamie can’t help but let out a frustrated bark right then and there. He grasps at his scalp in frustration, then reaches out and grabs Mako’s wrist, pulling in close to hiss into his ear.

“Do you even know what kind of demon that was?”

Mako shrugs with a degree of airlessness, only adding fuel to Jamie’s fire.

“A Kishi, ya drongo! A demon of the pride family! He spent that whole time sweet-talking you, didn’t he? All that gentle negging and little compliments--”

“He’s a bartender, Jamie, he’s supposed to be charismatic--”

“--filling your head with so much of yourself that you’d rather think that your Lilin boyfriend is jealous when in reality he only stands to gain from you getting turned on by someone else?!”

Suddenly, it starts to dawn on Mako. His smirk disappears and is replaced with a puzzled frown. “...Wait.”

“Think about it, Mako. I’m the walking epitome of a polygamist. Why the hell would I get jealous?”

Mako stands up straight and realises that, yes, for some reason he is feeling full of himself -- well, more so than usual -- and it’s definitely not the mood he woke up in back home. He had let down his guard, assuming that every Fallen was as benign and friendly as Jamie, and a combination of undue trust and sleep deprivation made him fall right into the demon’s hands.

“Christ. What happened to me?”

Jamie lets out a sigh of relief. “We are Greater Sins, Mako. We don’t sit around and passively absorb the natural emotions of people as they come and go -- we sow the seeds, we nurture and grow them, and then we consume them. You need to be more careful around humanoid demons.”

Mako nods. “I...I’m sorry, Jamie.”

“It’s all right,” he says, reaching up and smoothing a thumb over Mako’s tied-back hair. “I haven’t been very good exposure for you in that regard.”

Mako takes a pause for a moment, then looks down to reach out for Jamie’s hand and take it, returning to the path down to the water. 

“By the way,” he says, as they reach an empty selection of beach chairs under an umbrella, “what happened on the plane? You said something about too many people…”

“Oh.” Jamie shrugs. “I’m a dream-walker. I actually have very little control over entering other people’s dreams, like a magnet ta metal. On the plane, though, I kept getting tossed between person ta person...it was exhausting.”

“Ah, did you get some decent sleep once we got to the hotel?”

“Nahh, yeah, I’m fine now.” Jamie waves dismissively. “How about you though? You’re running on--what, four? Six hours?”

“Something like that.” Mako shrugs. “I probably don’t have enough energy to go swimming, but I have enough to watch you.”

Jamie laughs. “Alright. Fair enough. I’ll go get my laps in then.”

Mako sits back in the beach chair and keeps an eye on Jamie, feeling the minor buzz from his drinks earlier. He does spend the majority of his time watching the other, but after a while he ends up drifting off into a half-sleep. The soothing sound of the waves and the distant sounds of people are a lethal combination, but the heat keeps him from truly falling asleep -- just aware enough to know when Jamie is walking up to him, some unknown amount of time later, from the sounds of his footfalls.

He isn’t expecting Jamie to come crashing down into his belly, sopping of ocean water. Mako jolts at the sudden cold and weight on him, making a loud “oof” in the process. Jamie crawls higher up on him to plant a kiss on his lips.

“You’re wet,” Mako grumbles, having been so rudely jostled.

“Only for you,” he immediately shoots back.

Mako scoffs. “What was that about being the epitome of a polygamist…?”

“Oh, please,” Jamie dismisses, laying his head upon Mako’s chest. His hair is even wetter, slicked back and out of his face. “Act like I haven’t been exclusively nailing ya ever since I got back from Tibet.”

“I dunno, have you?”

“Of course! Wait.” Jamie lifts his head up just an inch to try to jog his memory. “Yep. Just you,” he confirms, then lays his head back down. Despite himself, Mako lays a hand on his head, stroking his wet hair.

“It warms my heart,” Mako says. “To know that.”

“Would you like it to stay that way?” Jamie asks. “Not many people have the ability to sate me all by themselves, but since you’re a witch...if we do it frequently enough, I wouldn’t need anyone else.”

Mako considers this for a while as he continues to stroke his wet boyfriend.

“I want you to do what makes you happy,” he decides.

“I want to make you happy.”

Mako gives a playful, exaggerated sigh. “Then we’re at an impasse.”

Jamie giggles, tapering off as the sobering thought comes back to him. “I mean it though.”

Mako grumbles at the notion of needing to define a line in the sand when he’s not really sure where it actually is. “It doesn’t feel right to keep you all to myself, especially when your life depends on it...I want to know that if I’m not feeling it, you’ve still got options.”

Jamie doesn’t hesitate at all. “Deal.”

Mako tilts his head up to look at Jamie. “Just like that? No negotiation…?”

“Nope. Because…” He nuzzles into the soft pectorals under his cheeks. “...that’s what I want, too. I want to be yours, but…” A gentle shrug. “Not to the point of putting myself in danger.”

A smile quirks at the edge of Mako’s face and he lets his head rest back down. The ocean breeze intensifies just enough to bring them relief from the heat and lulling both of them into an afternoon nap. 

\-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

The next day, they’re in a rather nice rental minivan headed out of the city to an unsuspecting suburb on the edge, closer inland. Both of them are more quiet than usual, as both of them are unsure what to say; Mako is just as content to wipe the cobwebs off of old memories and navigate solely from what he can remember as Jamie is to watch the passing scenery, tapping his fingers against the door’s window frame.

It’s an incredibly nice neighbourhood, if the sizes of houses and lots themselves are any indication. When Mako comes to a stop in front of one of them, Jamie looks over to him curiously.

“That’s where I grew up,” he says with a nod towards the white house on their right side. It’s a mostly white house with grey accents; massive windows are fitted in any space large enough to support one. There’s a bit of an old-age glamour about it, and from the two cars parked on the driveway, now under the supervision of a large family.

Jamie is silent for a moment to take it all in. “It was just you and your mother in that massive house?”

Mako shrugs. “We had a servant to help maintain the place.”

Jamie chuckles. “Full-time job, that. Did you need something from here?”

“Nah. I just wanted to see if it changed at all.”

“And…?”

Mako shrugs. “The only thing different than what I can remember is the landscaping in the front,” he decides. “Maybe they restored the paint or something. I don’t remember the grey being so dark.”

“Hm.” Jamie gives the house one more glance. “Do you need anything from it?”

“No, just satisfying my own curiosity.” Mako puts the car in drive and starts to peel away from the shoulder. Jamie arches his brow at him, but says nothing.

After ten minutes of driving, Mako turns to look at Jamie while they sit at an intersection, studying Jamie's “deep in thought” expression before finally breaking the silence. “What's on your mind?”

Jamie looks over to him with a quiet 'hm?’ and then shrugs. “Never lived in a house that big. I'm thinking about what it might be like.”

Mako turns his attention back to the road as the lights turn green. “I used to hate it, if you can believe that. Too big, too empty - too lonely. That's why I kept downsizing every time I moved. but seeing it again has made me feel...weirdly nostalgic for it.”

“Maybe we can get something like that together, once I have a job.” Jamie grins. “And it doesn't have to be empty. Maybe we can fill it with all kinds of creatures...maybe even small humans.”

Mako’s eyebrows raise. “Are you saying you want to have kids with me?”

Jamie giggles. “Well, no. But only because demon reproduction doesn't work like that. I'm thinking more adoption or something.”

Mako hums. He’s never considered the option before. Maybe more than a decade ago, but he figured that he'd always be childless, preferring freedom over family.

“...how does demon reproduction work?”

Jamie gives him a nonspecific gesture. “More like bees, I guess. There's a small number of demons colloquially known as broodmothers, and they literally just...sit around getting fucked and giving birth all day long.”

Mako frowns. “That's...grim.”

“Reckon they enjoy getting waited on hand and foot. No one fights them for dominance, honoured by all demons of inferno...getting hand-fed by imps…” Jamie shrugs. “All that said, though, I wouldn't want to be one. They're practically immobile.”

Part of Mako feels like he regrets asking. The other part of him just wants to know more. “Are you close at all with your broodmother?”

Jamie immediately scoffs. “Lilith is the broodmother of the lust family. Her mind is consumed with nothing but her...job.”

Well, that explains why Jamie has never really talked about family until now. “So no,” Mako says, and then the two of them fall into a thoughtful silence.

“But I wouldn't mind…” Jamie says slowly, after the conversation comes to a rolling stop, “...pretending to be pregnant like humans can be.”

Mako pictures it by reflex and feels a stirring in his groin. Jamie, with his extrasensory perception, notices and immediately snaps his attention towards Mako, grinning wildly. 

“Don't give me that look,” Mako snaps.

“No, no, let's follow this train of thought and see where it leads us,” Jamie insists. “Would you rather me still be like this, or do you want to see what I look like as a woman?”

“Jamie, I'm driving,” Mako says with a strain in his voice. “We can run kinky thought experiments later.”

Jamie settles into his seat, successfully dissuaded but not without a lingering smirk on his face. “Later, then.”

It's not much further before they turn into the parking lot for the storage centre. Both of them get out of the car and Mako leads the way inside and up to the third floor, where there's a large garage-type door waiting for them. Mako bends down to unlock it, then pulls it upward and reveals the small, two by three metre area, having collected a thin layer of dust and some cobwebs.

“How spooky,” Jamie coos with amusement as he steps inside. It's not a disorganised mess, though: in the back of the storage container there is a vintage vanity with a desk, flanked by dressers and filing cabinets.

“Sooo,” Jamie says, turning to Mako, who is paralysed by indecisiveness of where to start. “Are we just going to pack this all up so that it can come home with us…?”

“I'm not sure we have space for a lot of this stuff,” he responds, gesturing to the vanity.

“It's nice though. Too nice to get rid of. And perhaps…”

Jamie swipes a finger across it's dusty surface; as if responding to his touch, a ripple reflects across the surface of the upright oval mirror.

“A vital tool for your new job,” he finishes.

Mako stares. “What was that?”

“The proverbial crystal ball,” he explains. “Every witch uses something to divinate to reveal where the next large-scale angel attack will be.”

Mako hums in thought. “I only stored what I thought was most precious to my mother, back when I knew very little about what she did..I suppose our first step is to go through all of this and see if all of it is truly relevant.”

“We'll find a solution for everything else,” Jamie agrees. “You start from the top left and I'll start with the right.”

It’s all densely packed and stored, and when four hours pass with only a dent to show for it, they realise this process will probably take several days. They both decide to start packing things anyway, Because they might as well transfer it all to another, more easily accessible storage, instead of having to come back for the rest.

“Hey...Mako. I found something weird.”

Mako looks up from an assortment of gemstones secured in a red flock-lined black lacquer box. “Hm?”

Jamie holds up a single piece of parchment out from a folder. “It's a letter addressed to you, in her handwriting...but it's written in Enochian.”

“...What? Why would she do that?”

Jamie shrugs. “Are you literate enough to read yet?”

Mako shakes his head. “Hardly.”

“Then do you want me to read it for you?”

Mako hesitates for a moment, then shrugs. He's made the decision to share, in theory, an immortal life with Jamie, so he might as well be comfortable with Jamie reading something so personal. 

Jamie stands up and takes a seat on the vanity's chair. He reads the letter out loud, having to pause between each sentence in order to translate the next one in his head:

Dearest Mako,

I write this letter in hopes that you will never have to read it. If you are, that means the worst for me, or that I’ve been given the privilege to hand it to you myself.

If your voracious appetite to discover has led you far enough to be able to read this, I imagine you have several questions. They are not easy for me to talk about, which is why I’ve written this letter. I will start at the beginning.

There comes a time in every witch’s life where she feels compelled to create new life upon which to hand down her knowledge to ensure that the human race is protected. When I reached that phase myself, I thought nothing odd of it. I found the perfect suitor, a well-respected practitioner within our community, whom I called my “boyfriend”. He knew of my secrets, my desire, and was fully supportive.

However, the path was not as easy as I had expected. I performed the ritual to assure my child would be a daughter without flaw. I would then miscarry, two to three months later.

Jamie comes to a pause longer than usual; Mako looks up from his work to see a pained, empathetic look on his face. He gathers himself up and continues:

I went through this process six times.

“Christ,” Mako whispers.

The only one who knew was my boyfriend, who understood my grief and frustration. He convinced me to try without the ritual, to leave it up to chance, and that he would take the child if it were to be male. This was the only pregnancy to come to term. Though I knew it would be a boy, I was ecstatic. The plan would not fall through as it was made, however, as my boyfriend suffered a fatal stroke late in gestation.

Jamie puts the letter down on the surface of the vanity desk to give himself the chance to wipe his eyes. “Sorry,” he murmurs.

“It’s okay,” Mako returns. His emotions are conflicted -- part of him is overjoyed to hear his mother open up to him, even if it is posthumously, yet every word is agony to hear. Jamie doesn’t deserve to be brought down with this along with him. “You can stop reading...if you want,” he says, despite aching to know the rest of the story.

“No...no, it’s okay, I just…” He inhales deeply and lets it out slowly. “...wish she had told us--the Coven--about any of this. She didn’t have to do this struggle alone.” He picks up the parchment and continues.

I was suddenly alone, and I had no choice but to turn to my best friend for aid. I would not abandon you. Together, we devised a plan to try to help you live the most normal life you could...but I had not expected you to be so sharp and observant, to refuse to look away when asked. That is why, despite all I had done to protect you from the truth of reality, I would not be surprised if you, one day, are able to read this letter.

I hope that you can forgive me for all that I have done to you, and all that I have hidden from you. Regardless of how you feel for me, please remember that I love you more than the moon that controls our tides, more than the water that sustains our life.

Forever watching,

Nikora.

Mako lets out a breath he wasn’t aware he was holding. He presses his back against the wall of the container from his seated position, taking his glasses off and putting them on the ground to allow him the freedom of rubbing his face.

When he drops his hands, he notices that Jamie is squinting intensely at the letter.

“What’s wrong?”

“I think the last sentence is formatted like an incantation,” Jamie says. “A summoning incantation.” He turns to Mako. “It may be something she left for ya ta help ya. Would ya mind if I tried it?”

Mako shrugs. “Only way to find out what it is.”

Jamie stands up and peeks his head out of the storage container to see if anyone is around; upon seeing nothing, he dives back in and uses his true voice to recite the last line of the letter. To Mako’s ears, even though he’s not being that loud, it rattles his brain--and he realises that it’s due to the power of the words rather than volume itself.

When he finishes, the silence after is deafening, like there had been a gap torn into reality...but nothing happens.

“Huh,” Jamie says, shrugging. “Guess I was wrong.”

“Worth a try,” Mako decides, then goes back to sorting objects out of the box in front of him. “Thanks...for reading that letter for me.”

“My pleasure,” he chirps with as much cheerfulness as one could muster considering the content. For a few seconds, they return to their respective organisation and packing, until Mako hears an unfamiliar noise. He looks up from his work and sees Jamie’s hunched figure being towered over by a semitransparent eight-foot woman.

Her skin is dark, yet her lips and the extremely ornate, swirling moko on her chin still manage to be a stark contrast with the rest of her skin. Her long, coarse hair falls just past her bare shoulders, just after the line of a thick fur cape that is long enough to hide her arms. Her bandeau is made of concentric diamond shapes, leaving her midriff bare before an impossibly long flax skirt begins. It rustles with every small movement she does, which is entirely involved in passionately observing Jamie’s equally semitransparent, notched tail without actually touching him.

“Uh, Jamie…” Mako says slowly. “Who is that?” he says, gesturing vaguely behind the other.

“Hm?” Jamie looks up at Mako and then turns to look behind him. He looks up to see her face and immediately squawks in alarm, turning around in a rush and prostrating himself before her. She says nothing, but her apparent amusement only increases.

“Jamie?” Mako asks with slightly more urgency when he notices that Jamie’s body is trembling in fear.

“It’s Mistress Tangaroa,” Jamie responds, muffled by the concrete floor. “Your mother’s Queen.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Elzariel, Ren, Woden's Skadi, Zalanye, Muppet, Gigi, OfficialMettaton, and Lijan for supporting me this month!
> 
> Find me on Tumblr [here](http://murasakidoku.tumblr.com)!


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